Fairytale Gone Bad
by madame.alexandra
Summary: Sparrabeth/AU; COMPLETE. Five years after CotBP, Jack stumbles across Elizabeth in the worst of places. So, naturally, he rescues her...only to find there's more under the surface than he could have possibly guessed.
1. Numb

**Disclaimer: **I don't own anything.

**A/N (important): **AU. AFter CotPB, Will and Elizabeth returned to Port Royal and got married. Jack went on with pirate-y things. This story takes place 5 years later, when Jack meets Elizabeth in an unexpected place and the fairytale ending us nowhere in sight. (SMUT)

* * *

Elizabeth sat in front of the weathered vanity, her hand resting on the edge and her fingers lightly drumming as she stared at her changed reflection in the dusty mirror. She cleared the day's work out of her head, tried to forget the dirty room around her, and blocked out the rowdy shouts and vulgar noise from the bar below that reached her through the floorboards. It had been so long since she'd taken a good look at what she'd become.

The light in the room was dim, but her softly flickering candle provided enough light for her to study herself, even if it cast her face in a somewhat pale yellow glow. All for the better, perhaps; she wasn't sure she'd recognize herself anyhow. You can't really trust a mirror. It's nothing but a tool of young girls' vanity.

She reached up and dusted off the glass with her fingers, watching the particles of dirt swirling around in the air, looking for a new place to settle and build their grime. She sat on the vanity stool with a straight back and on hand resting idly in her lap, turning her head slightly left and right. Dark, kohl-lined eyes stared back at her, they eyelashes heavy and painted black and shades of gold powder brushed on the eyelids. Pink-rouged cheeks, for the misleading look of a young girl's modest blush, pursed lips with the remnants of red paint. Her hair, gathered in a dark black ribbon and pulled to the side to fall over one shoulder in a mass of perfumed and perfect curls, had lost its gold, and was now a rich chocolate with black streaked throughout it. A few curly tendrils framed her stoic face. Sandy brown eyes that had once been so fetching kept their color but lost their spark. Lost their naïveté.

Her skin was tan, still smooth and unblemished but no longer the valued alabaster of the British upper class. She liked it that way. There was no fragility, no sense of weakness. It attracted, brought thoughts of the wild and exotic to men, and endowed her with a darker beauty than the butterfly-like prettiness she'd once been too proud of. It made the gold earrings in her ears shine. She let her fingers drift to the opening of her gown, where the corset was loose, the tiny white strings dangling, and revealed the swell of her breasts and the dip of her cleavage. One sleeve fell off her shoulder, tailored loose purposely in the provocative fashion of her _profession._ The fabric of the dress was light, fell to her knees, cinched tightly around the waist and was cut open to the middle to reveal the corset beneath. It was a rich, deep red, adorned with black ribbons. One of the many vulgar costumes in her trousseau that made it easy to forget.

She wrenched her eyes away from the mirror and down to the mess of things spread out on the vanity before her. Open perfume bottles, ribbons, cigarettes, paints, useless trinkets. She took a cigarette between her fingers and lit it, closing her eyes as she inhaled. The mirror told her nothing. It showed what she was, not who she was. The answer to _who_ she was was locked away where she could never find it, where she would never look. She knew who she had been. And that girl had been destroyed.

A tap sounded against the door across the room behind her. She barely turned her head, propped her foot up on the vanity and reached for the red paint before her, holding the cigarette out as she 

leaned forward, ignoring the knock. The door clicked open as she lifted the lip-brush to her lips and stroked the dark red over her lips; she raised her eyes to the room behind her in the mirror, finding who had entered. She flicked the cigarette forward, allowing the girl to advance, and pressed her lips together to even out the red.

The young girl came to her side and leaned against the vanity, watching Elizabeth touch up her make-up, her pretty red hair tumbling all over. She was new, an Irish lass, and idealistic wench. Elizabeth pitied her. She seemed no more than fifteen, though she called herself one and twenty, and her heavy make-up did nothing to take the youth and inexperience out of her eyes. Elizabeth leaned back and took another drag before turning to the girl called Molly and lifting an eyebrow.

"I was not to be disturbed," she said in a mild voice, noticing Molly's sigh and apologetic look.

"I've come to warn ye, Liz, she's—" before the girl could finish her warning was cut off by the brisk entrance of the bar mistress, a towel in hand and a matter-of-fact look on her once-beautiful face.

"Out, lass. Yer s'pose to be entertainin' downstairs." She snapped gruffly. Molly tossed her curls down her back and left the room, giving Elizabeth a shrug behind the mistress's back. Elizabeth gave her superior a slow, warning look and turned back to her mirror, bringing the cigarette to her lips again.

"Tell whoever it is I'm not available tonight." She said, knowing perfectly well what the older woman was here for.

"Now, missy, you be the best in this place and you now it well. An' I won' be turnin' this one down; he been a good customer here since afore you got yourself known as queen ah this brothel."

Elizabeth tapped her cigarette against the ash tray and let her chair slam to the croup, shaking the old floorboards. She turned to face the other woman and pressed her lips together angrily.

"Tell him I'm not working tonight," she repeated sharply, "and give him to one of the other girls. Scarlett, perhaps. She thinks I've been stealing her men."

"I's already offered up all me other girls and this'uns had most ah them anyways. You may lead your men around on a string, Miss Swann, but ye still work for me, and you've got a customer."

"He's asking for me then? He won't have any other whore in the sordid place?" Elizabeth gnashed, glaring at the bar mistress. For all the money she brought into this place, a moment's respite from the groping and groaning men should be nothing to ask.

"He be wantin' a brunette." The woman finished with finality, turning and almost stomping out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

Elizabeth slammed her hand on the vanity in frustration and reached violently for a comb, jerking the ribbon out of her hair and arranging the curls about her shoulders and back and combing perfume through them. She threw the comb down and picked up the cigarette, propping her feet again on the vanity and leaning back in the chair. She brought the cigarette to her lips, then abruptly changed her mind and instead pressed the lit butt of it against her wrist, grinding her teeth against the sting, numbing herself. It would be a long night off if Madame couldn't say no to one drunken man.

She heard heavy footsteps on the wood and glanced at her face quickly, careful to hide all traces of disgust, and looked down to her corset, pulling the strings tighter to display her breasts better. She tossed the cigarette down in the ash tray, muttering quietly, and had just arranged her dress to satisfaction when she heard the door behind her. Business as usual.

She tilted her head coquettishly to the side and put her index finger between her teeth before speaking.

"You'll make this quick," she said, not a question at all, as she swiveled around in the chair in time—to her surprise—to hear her name called quite clearly in a shocked voice. She raised her eyebrow in sudden interest and looked around more quickly. Her chair slammed to the floor.

She looked at him, standing in the middle of her room with quite the rattled look on his face. She caught herself in enough time not to let her composure slip, not to show any sign of astonishment or embarrassment, and pulled her finger from her mouth with a soft _pop_.

"Jack Sparrow,"

_Of all the whorehouses in all the world he walks into mine._ Not that she really had leave to be surprised in any fashion. Wasn't this Tortuga? And didn't Scarlett ceaselessly blather on about the prowess of Jack Sparrow? So he was the brunette-seeking 'good customer'. Small world.

She allowed him his moment of stupefied appraisal before languidly getting up and shoving the stool away with a deft foot; she walked towards him slowly, trying not to remember the circumstances under which she's last seen him. Port Royal. Will. _No_. She stopped at tilted her head up at him, allowing a slow smile to spread across her lips.

"Fancy seeing you again." She said, her eyes scanning his face. She glanced over his shoulder to check that the door was shut soundly and pressed her palm against his coat, fingering the lapel as she would any other man. He pushed her back, hardly roughly but more in bewilderment.

"What are you _doing _here?" he asked harshly, looking at her as if he wasn't sure he even had the right person. She blinked, taken aback not by the tone of his voice but by the anguished expression of his dark eyes. She jerked her shoulders out of his grip and lifted an eyebrow at him, pulling the string of her corset so it loosened.

"Does a worldly man such as yourself need an answer to that question?" she replied tartly, not wishing to inspire any untoward questions. She stepped up to him again, and slid her hand up his shirt to its opening. He caught it tightly and stayed it, stepping back from her again.

"This isn't what I--I can't do this." He muttered, releasing her hand. Elizabeth let out a derisive laugh and raised her eyes to the ceiling, grabbing his wrist herself this time and digging her nail into the skin. She pulled him forward and turned him around, so she stood with her back facing the door, and gave him a hard look.

"You asked for a brunette."

"I didn't anticipate having the pleasures of your company, my dear," he replied sarcastically. _Oh, what a gentleman._ Was he unwilling because he saw her still as the innocent society girl mooning after the blacksmith? She'd shatter that illusion before he could blink twice. Elizabeth drew her finger along his cheek and over his lips seductively, pursing her lips.

"You wouldn't doubt my ability to perform, Captain?" she asked mildly, lowering her eyelids. He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. When he opened them again, and spoke, his words were tense.

"I don't want this."

"You do," she said simply. "I see it. You may hide it here," she touched his lips, "but you can't hide it…_here._" She slid her hand to the waistband of his pants. His eyes flew open and he pushed her back determinedly.

"Where've you left your fine blacksmith, Miss Swann?"

Something dark flickered in her eyes and her jaw tightened. She gripped his lapel roughly and pulled his head towards her; her voice was angry when she spoke.

"Did you pay? _Did you pay for me_?" she demanded, stomping her foot against the floorboards, her face almost livid. Jack threw her hand away from him but she only took his wrist and held it uncomfortably twisted.

"I did,"

"Then you'll get what you paid for." She said coarsely, drowning out his words and shoving him backwards to the bed. She positioned her knees on either side of his thighs and pressed her lips harshly against his, shoving his coat off at the shoulder. She jerked his dirty white shirt over his head and rand her hands along his tanned chest, drawing her nails across the taut muscles, surprised at the sudden feeling of excitement. How nice for once to not fake passion in these demeaning moments. She pressed her lips against his neck, trailing her mouth over his shoulder and working the fastening of his ridiculous belt with her free hand. She stopped a moment to loosen the ties of her dress, to untie the bow at the waist and let the crimson fabric fall away to the white corset and nothing else. Jack grabbed her shoulder tightly and held her; his head was tilted back and his eyes closed tightly. He bit his lip; she took his mouth under hers again, slipping her tongue into the hot confines of his mouth, her hand still groping at the waistband of his breeches. She squeezed her knees against his thighs, finally tossing his belt aside and pushing through the buttons of his breeches. Jack slid his hand up her thighs and pressed her closer, his initial objection abandoned. She freed him from his breeches and broke the kiss, locking her arms behind his neck before she moved on him. He groaned; his head fell forward against her shoulder; he dug his nails into her back and thrust, pulling her hair and sliding his hands up her back to her shoulders. She pressed her knees against him again, his hot lips pressed into her neck, breathing heavily. His movement sent a shiver up her spine and she moaned softly; he thrust again and she kept her knees tight around him until she couldn't stand it and at the last gripped his shoulder tightly and cried out loudly, bringing him to his crescendo. He groaned again as he finished, and she collapsed against him, her curls ruined and wet, her flushed cheek resting on his broad shoulders.

His fingers were in her hair, he held her head in his hand, and his shoulders shook as he evened out his breathing. She felt his pulse against her cheek and closed her eyes, letting her head rest a moment longer where it lay. His familiarity was comforting, the warmth of his skin soothing, and seeing him, a living thing of her past, induced despair to creep into her mind though she railed against it, having disallowed any emotion but anger or indifference for so long now.

She lifted her head off his shoulder, avoiding his eyes, and moved off of him, plucking her dress off the floor and slipping on, tying the ribbon and lacing up the corset as she sat on the bed next to him, her knee touching his. He readjusted his clothing and got up, walking around the room to find where she'd unceremoniously tossed his coat and shirt. She turned her head, drawing her legs up on the bed beneath her, squeezing her ankle subconsciously. She watched him pull his shirt over his head with the familiar empty feeling. When he turned, and caught her watching him, she turned away indifferently and got up, pulling the string on her corset for no other reason than to make use of her hands. She picked up a new cigarette from the vanity; he caught her hand and threw it back down on the table, turned her towards him. His eyes were searching, he scanned her face, and she gave him no hint of any feeling.

"Elizabeth Swann," he said. She knew his tone. She hated it. She wanted to be alone, to wash him from her skin as she did all the meaningless others and possibly get good and drunk and never remember this night ever happened. It was one of those that would infinitely haunt her nightmares. Her dark, tormenting nightmares.

She didn't want him to look at her like he did now. He could keep his memory. The ones from the past or the one just created, he could take it with him, but she didn't want him here any longer. Not to ask questions or make statements or tease. She pulled her wrist out of his grip and picked up the cigarette again, holding it delicately between her fingers.

"It's been a pleasure," she said, with a mocking, aristocratic bow of her head. Turned towards the mirror again. She could barely keep her hand from shaking. So long since she'd seen a familiar face, and for it to be him to see her…to have her like this…and suddenly she hated her destroyer more than ever before.

He took her arm above the elbow and turned her back towards him and she reacted angrily, jerking her head around.

"What do you _want_?" she snapped viciously, almost desperately, her eyes darkening as they always did when she was angered. Jack looked back at her a split second, his own expression less-than-tender and let her go, roughly, so she took a few steps backward.

"You need a bloody strong drink," he snapped, striding across the room before she could stop him. He slammed the door behind him, making the floorboards shudder, and seized in a sudden fit of rage she picked up the nearest vial of perfume and threw it against the wall, allowing the loud _shatter_ to mask her grunt of frustration. She collapsed onto the vanity stool again, refusing to look in the mirror, and pulled at her hair, fighting the urge to scream until her throat ripped.

She felt that annoying prick at her eyes that was less and less common these days, tears pulling at her after years of training herself not to ever, _ever_ cry. And why she wanted to cry now she didn't know, she just knew seeing him again had ripped open old wounds and reminded her of a time when she was happy. She jerked open the top drawer of her vanity, reaching for the opium kept hidden and only used on the rarest occasions. She was not going to cry. She shoved her things out of the way and reached for a light—but the clicking of the door interrupted her again. She looked up; her teeth clenched, and saw him in the mirror. Drink in hand.

* * *

The straight shot of vodka sedated her violent mood. She faced him now, her back to the wretched mirror, still perched on the old vanity stool and leaning backward. Her cigarette lay in its ashtray, the embers glowing eerily at the end. He sat against the headboard of her bed, friendly bottle of rum in his hand, ignoring her wary glare.

"Of all the places I expected to run into ye again, lass," he said, popping the cork from the rum bottle expertly. He lifted it to his lips and drank. "This was not one."

"Expectations are rarely fulfilled to our fantasies." She answered sardonically, tapping her nails against the wood repetitively, hardly giving him any encouragement. She didn't understand his interest. Didn't know why he bothered to stay here, with her, in this dirty room above a tavern full of lawless drunks. "And I'm sure," she added suddenly, mockingly, "that was hardly the reunion you anticipated, even in your most salacious dreams."

"Hardly," he agreed, raising his bottle to her. She looked away and picked up the glass resting near her hand on the table. She examined it and set it back down, ringing her nail against it to fill the silence. He shifted, drawing his booted leg up to rest his arm on and kept his keen eye on her. His gaze was unnerving. Like he was peeling away her skin and staring into the depths of her shredded soul.

"'Ave you been lifting your skirts around Tortuga long? Or is this a recent endeavor the general boredom of life with a eunuch blacksmith has induced?" He queried surreptitiously, watching her sharply to catch any alteration in her detached demeanor. Nothing but a stiff look.

"Two years," was her informative reply, hard and unfeeling. His eyes drifted to the hand that rested on her knee and he made note of its telling nakedness in the jewelry department. She seemed to be made of steal. There was no warmth in her any longer. No vivacity. Just coldness.

"What I find intriguing," he started, lifting his hand in front of his face and examining it needlessly, "is the as of yet unknown reason that you ended up in this _hovel _when I clearly remember leaving you as the blushing bride of your dearest Mr. Turner."

The stool slammed the floor, the noise crisp and loud in the sudden silence.

"_That_ didn't work out." She hissed savagely, her eyes as black as he'd ever seen them. He noticed her absently reach down and twist her ring finger; the finger he'd already seen had lost its adornment.

"Then I'm not to refer to you as Mrs. Turner?"

She did not grace him with an answer. She turned away suddenly and picked up her cigarette, tapping the ashes off before lifting it to her lips. Jack leaned forward, aware that he'd touched a nerve and regretting any words he'd said that might have hurt her. Elizabeth. What a cruel place the world was, if its fates and trials could turn this spirited girl into a common whore. In a quick moment she whirled to face him, he could almost detect an increase in wetness in her empty eyes.

"What do you want with me?" she demanded, standing up so fast the stool tumbled over behind her. She dropped the cigarette to the floor, where smoke curled up from the edge and disappeared into the air. She stomped it with the heel of her slipper. He let the bottle drop to the floor and got up from her bed, standing across the room from her. "Do not _look_ at me like that!" she whispered, closing her eyes and swallowing.

"I never wanted to find you in a place like this." He told her. "You shouldn't be here." she tossed her head and threw her eyes to the ceiling, her snort of laughter scornful.

"Because the idea of a prim society girl like me spreading my legs for the commoners seems wrong to you? Because _your_ morality tells you that my being on my knees in front of these vulgar men is indecent?"

He crossed the room quickly and took her wrist, shaking her.

"Stop it," he growled, wanting to cover his ears. As hysterical as her words might sound, her composure was still nothing but the calculated coolness, the sarcasm that she'd first welcomed him with. She didn't realize how different she was from all of the other sluts in all of the other brothels. "I don't know what brought you to this, love, but it's far below what you're worth."

That stopped her struggling. She looked up at him, letting her wrist lie still in his grip, and shook her head, her eyebrows slanted and furious. When she found his eyes, his grim look drained the anger from her and she let her arm drop; his fingers loosened the second her shoulders lost their irate tenseness.

"What I'm worth," she sneered, dark laughter in her voice. She turned away and returned to the bed, settling on it with her arm slung over the post at the end. "Thirty pounds and a good fuck."

The words tore at his head, coming from her. What had happened in these years, since rescue by the battlements? He shuddered to know, unwitting of anything that could ruin her so completely. He crossed the room and stood before her; she looked up without encouragement, her eyes hollow, and the vileness of her lewd statement still ringing in the air.

"Get out of this mess." He said sharply, going on before she spat out her retort. "Come on the _Pearl_ with me. Get out of here."

"No." she stood, rejecting him defiantly, refusing to accept what she could only assume to be misplaced pity. She heard the sudden sound of a bell in the distance and looked back at him. "You'll be going or they'll find you here and charge you."

"You won't rot in this hellhole."

"If you want to help me," she said in a low, softer voice, "leave me _alone_." When she raised her eyes to his again, she didn't find kindness.

"You think you can live _this_ the rest of your life?" he growled, glaring at her. She wanted to push him away; she had to have him out of this room and out of this port now—but something in his uncharacteristic concern stopped her from chucking the nearest heavy object at him. She closed her eyes and opened them again slowly. She reached up and pulled his head down to hers, standing on tiptoes and pressing her forehead against his. She wanted to keep this. She needed to have this, some kind of moment to hang onto when she felt the will to live sleep away. She wanted to hate the world and its cruelty and then remember that someone had showed enough interest to tell her she was better.

"One more time," she whispered, her lips brushing against his. "For old times' sake." She covered his mouth with hers and drank him in, savoring the taste of ocean salt and rum on his sun-chapped lips, breaking her cardinal rule to never forgo taking payment for her favors. With this, at least she wouldn't be haunted by the memory of her reunion with the man who'd once saved her life as just another customer.

Jack wrapped his arms around her and drew her close; loathe to taking this wanton advantage of her and at the same time sensing the softening in her muscles. His hand reached for the ties of her corset, and again the dress was loosened and disposed to the floor. She pushed his coat off again and he let his fingers sink into every inch of her visible skin; she parted her lips from his and moaned. He pushed her back towards the bed until her knees pressed against the edge and bend; she let him lean her back until she was stretched out with him holding her beneath him, his mouth again hot against her neck. She relieved him of his shirt again, and he removed the corset, baring all her skin this time, running his hands over her stomach and ribs. She raked her nails down his bare back and pulled his mouth to hers again, her fingers removing his belt with no difficulty this time. He maneuvered his breeches expertly. She lifted her knees and wrapped one leg around his waist, pressing her heel into the small of his back.

"Lizzie," he groaned against her lips. She arched her back until she felt him; he didn't hesitate and she didn't need him too. It was her head against his shoulder, her nails scarring his back, and his arms that steadied her. Her breathing heightened, she squeezed his shoulders tightly, arching her back still, heat pooling in the pit of her stomach. He crushed his lips against hers again, his hand knotted in her dark hair. She dug her heel into his back and let his name slip from her lips, pushing her forehead against his, her eyes closed. His shoulders convulsed, he thrust, Elizabeth cried out, heat breaking over her, her body shaking as he collapsed next to her, their legs still tangled in the mussed sheets around them.

It seemed they lay for hours, sweaty and hot, among the sheets, his strong arm slung over her waist, his legs hooked in hers and her head on the relaxed muscles of his biceps. Still unsteady from their passionate coupling, turned her head away from him and stared at the foot of the bed, recalling other times and other men. Broken, suppressed memories of other nights with one man surfaced in her mind.

"I'd forgotten it could be like this."

She felt him shift. His hand on her spine startled her and her muscles tightened suddenly. He drew his finger once from her neck to her waist; reached over and pulled the hair off her face and pressed his lips against the back of her neck. She closed her eyes, feeling him get up. The floorboards creaked as he moved around, gathering his clothing. Leaving.

She hated herself. He looked at her and saw the girl he used to know and she hated him for that. He didn't know. He wasn't there for those three years that ripped away illusions and fantasies and blatantly displayed her foolishness. He didn't know she'd seen her dreams go up in smoke and had her heart broken until she couldn't find the pieces to pick up and fix herself. He just saw her now, and how he had seen her. She didn't know what it was. Maybe the soft whisper of Lizzie against her sleeps in the heat of the moment, maybe the knowledge that even if he could never, ever change it all, he could offer respite, but she gathered the sheets around her and sat up to see him standing in the open doorway, one hand on the doorknob.

"Jack," she called softly. He turned around.

"I want out of here."

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"of all the whorehouses in all the world"--play on a line from CASABLANCE

title taken from a song by the CDM CHARTBREAKERS

**Reviews are much appreciated**


	2. Reflection

**Disclaimer: **No Copyright infringement intended. Just having fun :)

**A/N: **If you're getting annoyed with my being mum on the subject of what actually happened to Will and Elizabeth, you'll get a taste of that soon. And for all you Whelp-haters out there, its shows Mr. Turner in a VERY unflattering light. Enjoy!

**Note: **Thanks so very much for the lovely reviews, I very much appreciate it. And for those of you who don't review, please do. It makes us authors feel special ;)

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**Chapter Two**

She left the _Faithful Bride _without a second thought or a glance back. There was no attachment, no sense of loss. They would wake in the morning and find her gone; Madame would bewail the loss of her 'best girl', Scarlet would triumphantly re-assume her place as highest-acclaimed whore, and little Molly would be left to the mercy of the older women who knew the things she hadn't been taught in order to survive. None of this induced her to hesitate in her step as she left it behind.

The early morning sky was grayish purple, not yet touched by the golden light of the sun, though a faint sparkle on the ocean was evidence of the slowly rising provider of earth's light. Elizabeth stood on the beach below the dock, the ocean lapping at her bare feet. Her short dress flapped around her knees; she held her slippers in her hand as she looked up at the Black _Pearl. _She remembered it exactly how it floated lazily before her now: frayed black sails, intricately carved hull, scuffed sides. Prized possession of the rugged captain who sacked Port Nassau without a single shot. She looked around and up slightly to the dock as thoughts of the captain entered her head. He stood arguing with a shady looking man over a crate that stood between them, waving his arms around characteristically. She turned and walked up the bank, swinging her shoes, ignoring the rocks and bits of wood that stabbed her feet. She stepped onto the worn wood of the dock and Jack glanced at her over the other man's shoulder. He took something out of his coat pocket and thrust it into the trader's hand; the man passed Elizabeth on his way off, grinning gleefully and counting the gold pieces in his palm.

She looked at Jack silently as she approached, her eyes cool and shaded by her painted eyelashes. He turned his back halfway to her and gave a sharp whistle in the direction of his ship. Two men appeared at the side and he raised his arm and flicked it in the direction of the crate. The men descended the gangplank, one the proud, well-defined black man who'd given Elizabeth the first good slap of her life when she'd been prisoner; the other the bald midget whose bite much outweighed his size. Bo'sun afforded her nothing more than a glance; he didn't recognize her as the governor's daughter who'd once foolishly thrown the pirates code in his face and expected him to keep to it. He saw her as a harlot his now-captain had for some reason allowed to follow him to the dock. He picked up the crate effortlessly and acknowledged Jack's storage order with a stiff nod.

"You, take tha'," Jack barked, throwing his hand at the small chest that Elizabeth had haphazardly tossed few of her possessions in. Uncaring as she was about anything she'd purchased since her arrival at Tortuga, common sense reminded her she'd have to have something to wear when sailing the ocean indefinitely. Marty saluted Jack in a rather comical way, and gave Elizabeth a more-than-quizzical stare as he did away with her carry-on. She showed no sign of warmth as she returned his stare, almost challenging him with her eyes. He scuttled away, bearing the slight weight of the chest easily_._

The distraction provided by the things to move and the men to move them vanished, and she had nothing to do but transfer her cold gaze to him and glean what she could from his slightly less frozen eyes. She didn't know what to say to him. She _had_ nothing to say to him. His sudden re-entrance into her much-altered life did nothing to change the person she'd spent so much time molding herself into; she was still cold, introverted, cynical and bitchy through and through, and she had the keen suspicion he hadn't grasped the full concept of that: he had no idea what he was doing. If he saw himself as the rescuer, so be it. She had only the minutest interest in getting inside his head and pulling out the reason that spurred him to offer her a place on his ship. She certainly wasn't the damsel being rescued in this story. She'd taken her place in the pool of Tortuga's finest quietly, performed every deceitful and immoral bit of trickery and promiscuity in her previously unutilized oh-so-sweet character to obliterate every aspect of the past that nearly destroyed her. She was so far changed from the sassy debutante he'd first pulled from the icy waters of Port Royal, and she'd already made her unbreakable vow to never revisit what had happened or who she used to be. He was not her rescuer. She took care of herself.

But that didn't mean she knew why she was here. She looked at him, her shoulders held straight in that aristocratic posture that had been instilled into her since birth, and tried to pinpoint the exact moment his words had hit her and she'd agreed to. She balked at the answer in her head; the remembrance of the sudden crack she'd felt in her armor when she'd seen him standing in her room and heard his refusal to treat her like he would some other tavern strumpet. He hadn't borne the brunt of her bi-polar self-destructiveness as had the other men did because he caught her unawares and brought ten times too many memories flooding over her meticulously built walls for her to repress and awakened something long dead and shattered when he moaned that quiet Lizzy in her ear. She saw Jack and she remembered. She saw Jack and she couldn't help but see _his_ face in her head and recall every little horror the single syllable that was _his_ name inflicted on her.

She shrugged her shoulders almost imperceptibly, giving him a hardened smirk that silently asked him why he couldn't take his eyes off her. Truth be told she was tired of him staring at her, even if she wasn't bothering to look in any other direction herself. Her impulsive decision to let him whisk her away may confuse and drive her to distraction now, but it didn't mean she was going back to her lascivious existence in this _fine_ place. But she was suddenly, acutely, and angrily aware that he had the dangerous ability to affect her sensibilities to the point where she might at any moment succumb to the violent tears that had been kept prisoner since the night born out of hell two years ago.

And that frightening realization was unacceptable.

A raucous catcall violently interrupted the easy morning; the men of Jack's crew announcing their arrival back at port after their foray into the town of innumerable pleasures available for men of questionable morals. She recognized two of the first who stumbled a bit drunkenly onto the ship, one giving a wobbly salute to his captain as he stomped by, relating his night in a loud voice to his equally tipsy companion. Elizabeth looked around with veritable amusement at the men making their way back to berth in twos and threes. Jack grabbed one of them by the scruff of the neck and gave a sharp reprimand, gesturing to the various crates on the dock that contained whatever was needed for good honest pirating. The man was decidedly unfazed but followed Jack's order and led the other crew members in stocking the ship. Elizabeth sat down on one of the dock posts, sliding her feet easily back into her shoes and watching coolly.

"OY! Watch yerself with that!" came a gruff voice from the ship, followed by a thud. Jack snapped his head in that direction and grumbled in a low voice about incompetence and drunk animals. "Where be Jack?" Elizabeth was sure she recognized the authoritative voice, and she stood languidly and made her way to the ship, walking up the gangplank without a cue from Jack.

"Cap'n's ain't had his fill a' the wenches yet," snickered one.

"Ah, shut yet trap Ragetti. 'E's on the dock!"

Elizabeth stepped over the edge of the ship and rested her hand on the edge just in time to come face to face with a red-faced Joshamee Gibbs, who had his mouth open and ready to shout at Jack until he found her in his path and stopped short, his eyes widening considerably. She'd know him for too long and too well for him _not_ to recognize her, and she found a weird enjoyment in seeing the shock that spread over his wizened features.

"Miss Elizabeth?" he asked incredulously, and she could see in his eyes his recollection of telling her stories of pirates behind her father's back on the voyage from England so many years ago. She flashed him a grin.

"Beautiful morning, is it not, Mr. Gibbs?" his taken aback response almost prompted laughter from her. "Startled, are you?"

"I hardly even recognized you, Miss 'lizbeth…" he faltered, as if unsure if he was insulting her or not. Elizabeth took pity on him for a moment, she had the idea she'd quite nearly given the first mate a heart attack.

"I'd hardly expect you to, after nearly five years." Something rang in her mind as she said the words. _Five_ _years_. Name something that can happen in five years. _Total destruction_. She ignored the response. These dialogues with herself were starting to make her wonder if she was going mad. She lived in a solitary world of derision.

She heard Jack's footsteps heavy on the plank behind her, and he put his hand on her shoulder and moved her out of the way so he could get onto the ship.

"Head count?" he demanded.

"All here, Cap'n. Drunk as skunks maybe, but in a right better mood then they were few days ago." Mr. Gibbs replied. Jack clapped the older man on his broad shoulder and nodded.

"Good man. Mr. Gibbs, you no doubt remember our mutual friend Miss Swann?" Gibbs's eyes furrowed at the title Jack addressed her with, but when he turned his eyes to her, her eyes had taken back their hard, warning look. He nodded, closing his mouth, no doubt swallowing the correction he'd had on his lips. "Spectacular. Accustom the crew to the recent development of her presence on this vessel indefinitely."

He slapped him on the back and walked away, leaving Gibbs with a rather confused look on his face. Elizabeth turned towards the plank and kicked it off to the dock with her foot, its use being moot now that the ship was about to set sail. She glanced back over her shoulder with a devilish smirk.

"They won't mind terribly, I'm sure," she started, a fleeting thought rising in her head of how amazed she was that she still retained that blue-blooded ballroom speech of the aristocracy even now, "even if I _am_ bad luck."

The corners of his mouth twitched at her jest and he shrugged his shoulders. She turned around, leaning her back against the raised wall of the ship and stretched out her arms, taking in the surroundings around her. She hadn't become a point of interest yet; the crew was still busy with pulling anchor and adjusting sails for the push off from port. She let her eyes roam to the helm, where Jack stood with his hands resting on the wheel. The breeze stirred her hair and she shook it back out of her face, turning her eyes to the horizon spread out on the other side of the ship. She sun was visible now, its rays spreading out slowly but surely over the rolling blue water.

She kept her back to Tortuga.

* * *

--All of the chapter's names are taken from song titles, though sometimes the lyrics pertain to the chapter and sometimes not. this chapter is Reflection: Christina Aguileira, Chapter one was Numb: Linkin Park

--Again, I cordially remind you to review!


	3. Scars

**Disclaimer: **Yeah, I'm just not ever going to own it.

**A/N: **Thanks so much to the people who reviewed, i enjoy your comments and I really appreciate the feedback. And guys, please, I enjoy writing and I really appreciate hearing comments on the story, so all you 250+ hits out there, please drop a line.

_Italics: _indicate flashback

* * *

**Chapter Three**

Dusk slowly faded into night. There was still the faintest orange-pink light glowing on the vast horizon, but the moon had conquered the sun and hung high in the sky, half-full and shining. It cast a milky glow on the water, more peaceful this time than spooky, and as she glanced about her, Elizabeth found only men milling about after the day's duties—not the gruesome skeletal figures of before. Though that sight hardly would have drawn a flinch from her now. She'd welcome skeletons over what she saw in her dreams.

There were starting to take more notice of her now, when things had quieted down. During the hustle of pushing off from Tortuga, she'd been just a curious figure leaning against the side of the _Pearl_, someone who happened to be wearing a dress, but they really hadn't the nerve to make an outcry or stop and question when there was business to be done. But now, safely out to sea with Tortuga only a strip of land in the near distance, the glances and double takes were becoming outright stares. She couldn't say it actually bothered her. Most did not recognize her, though a few did. These were the ones with whom she'd been in closer quarters with; Master Ragetti had wasted barely a moment in greeting her with a enthusiastic '_'ello_ _poppet_!' that came after he saw her, dropped a crate on his never-far-from him balding partner Pintel and waved. The over-the-top greeting diverted her, as she wondered whether he actually remembered he'd been on the _kidnapping_ side of the spectrum the last time. But bygones were bygones and the past was going to stay in the bloody past.

She rested her chin in her hand, leaning against the ship's side and staring over the vast ocean. Her hair was tied back with a ribbon, falling down her back to keep it out of her eyes. She really should just chop it off and be done with it…but that was something she just couldn't bring herself to do, for no particular reason. She didn't blink as she gazed unseeingly, hearing words in her head.

"'_Til death do us part."_

"…_for better or for worse…"_

"_I will love and honor you for all the days of my life."_

**STOP. **

She shoved them to the back of her mind, not daring to bring those thoughts, those memories to the front of her thoughts. Think of anything but that. Anything but _him_.

But that was all there was. She could think about England, about her mother, about her father, about Tortuga even…but all of it, _everything_, led back to and somehow connected with _that_. This was sickeningly ironic, as she'd explicitly forbidden herself to ever go there again. Why dwell on those demons when her subconscious plagued her with the re-runs every night? She spent her days in Tortuga gambling, drinking, flirting with whoever paid her to do so, buying the exquisite goods that the pirates brought in, prancing around and cattily provoking Scarlett and her lot with offbeat remarks alluding to their waning desirability as she slowly took over their territory. She couldn't help but allow herself a small smile as she thought of Scarlett's reaction to Jack Sparrow's entering the _Faithful_ _Bride_ with a pouch full of gold pieces and walking straight pass her. But Scarlett had never really rankled her; she'd simply amused herself with the rival girl's quick temper and unintelligible ranting. You had to have something to amuse yourself when you existence was men and cigarettes.

But here? Here there was open sky. Rolling ocean. Blistering sun. Rain clouds and birds. Maybe twenty-five people at the most. There was nothing to distract, no men to entertain, to use as tools to block the crushing nostalgia. She pressed her nail absently into the cigarette burn on her wrist, her eyes stinging slightly at the pain. Well, there was that. There was rum. She supposed she could drink herself into a constant state of inebriation though the captain had, by all observations, already claimed that stunt as his.

"_I should have told you every day from the day I met you. I love you."_

"_I love him, Father."_

"_Why can't we fix this?"_

"_You've ruined everything!"_

"_I don't even know you anymore…"_

"_Everything is your fault!"_

"_I HATE you!"_

Words, words, loud; deafening and reverberating around her skull. She smacked her palm against the wood to jolt her ears with the news, resisting the urge to cover her ears and scream. That would certainly draw more attention from the crew than she wished to have directed at her. She dug her nails into the wood, hating the feeling, eager for distraction and almost giving Mr. Gibbs the lap-dance of his life when he unknowingly provided it.

"Miss Elizabeth? Are ye hungry?"

She turned to face him quickly, her hair escaping from its bow and a few curls falling to frame her face. She wasn't aware of how wild her eyes looked; but he stepped back a bit when he saw the not-yet hidden despair in them.

"You all right, Missy?"

She swallowed, running her hand up her arm to get rid of the goose bumps.

"Quite all right." She answered sharper than she'd meant it. Still, it didn't at all bother her that she'd so far come off to everyone as detached, arrogant, and cool. The less friendly they thought her the less questioning she'd endure. Better to be unapproachable.

"The crew be takin' dinner in the hold, if ye want to join 'em. Or ye can eat in Cap'n's cabin if ye wish for a bit less of a spectacle." Mr. Gibbs informed her, giving her quite the searching look. She realized it was probably this man even more than Jack who was stunned at her transformation, at the knowledge that Jack had visited his usual haunt and come bag with her. He had, for all his bluster about even _miniature_ women being bad luck, tolerated her following him around and questioning him about pirates and the like. She took pity on him and softened her face a little, giving him a smile.

"I should think it would be the more practical idea to eat in Jack's cabin." She answered, glancing around suddenly. "Where is he?" she asked, the thought suddenly occurring to her that she'd be taking dinner with him and _that_ prospect wasn't all that appetizing either, considering.

"He's just left doing sum'in, he said that…" Mr. Gibbs trailed off suddenly, bringing a smirk to her face. Chances were, if he didn't want to repeat what Jack said it was either highly offensive (meaning amusing) or vile. How sweet that he didn't want to repeat it to her…sensitive ears.

"Thank you, Mr. Gibbs." She said, walking past him without another word towards the cabin at the other end of the ship. She had a sudden curiosity to poke around in Jack's cabin and dig up some of his secrets. That would provide excellent distraction.

It was a different atmosphere than the last time she'd been in this room. That is, this time she wasn't tied in some revolting dress and held captive by that charming Hector Barbossa. Jack's taste was a bit less gaudy, not to say the pirate actually bothered with decorating his space, but the room just wasn't as covered in fine things bought to fill the emptiness of half life as it had been previously. There was a knock on the door and she stepped away from it, giving enough swing for the knocker to enter the room.

It was one of the men who didn't recognize her. He carried a tray with him, and gave her a curt nod as he set it on the table in the room, leaving almost immediately. She felt the sudden annoyance that always flared on being served as if she couldn't lift a finger to do her own work, but pushed it back down, knowing very well she could have walked down to the hold and gotten her own damn dinner.

She swung the chair out from the desk that doubled as a table and straddled it, resting her chin on the back. She reached over it and picked at the food, unsure if she was hungry or not. She finally stabbed a piece of mutton with the fork he'd left for her and ate, for want of anything better to do. She looked around the room with interest. There were trinkets from where she could only assume was all over the world; curious looking things she'd never seen and beautifully crafted ornaments. She wondered if they were keepsakes to him, if they carried any meaning, or if he just fancied beauty in everything, not only his women. Elizabeth looked down again and nudged her plate over, her attention caught by the paraphernalia the man had placed it on.

A captains log, an inventory sheet, a stub of charcoal, a half empty ink pot and a dull quill. But most catching to the eye, piles and piles of expertly drawn maps, with markings on them that weren't on any other map she'd other seen. Landmasses she'd never studied, odd longitudes and latitudes with foreign names. She put her finger on a long line drawn from one place to the place labeled Isla de Muerta. Isle of the Dead. Probably where it all began.

She got up suddenly, her stomach all of the sudden empty and hollow, and glanced around his room, looking for what she knew had to be hidden somewhere. It rolled over and hit her slippered foot as she thought about it. Shaking her head, she bent down and uncorked the rum bottle, seriously contemplating the notion of drunkenness. She settled for a long drink instead, and reached around behind her for the apple someone had placed on her plate. Something amused her when she found it was red.

She pulled her foot up and rested it on her knee, a very unladylike position that gave off a masculine air. She tilted her head back, rocking the legs of the chair, giving the innocent ceiling a killer glare. She closed her eyes, squeezed them shut. It was silent. It was too quiet.

_Blood on the sheets. Blood on her nightgown. Blood on the rags. She was pale and hurting and sick and she wanted him to hold her and wipe her tears and tell her it was okay. He came in, his hair looking like he knotted his hands in it over and over outside her door; the doctor had gone._

"_Are you okay?"_

"_I'm sorry."_

_He put a hand over hers, resting on the top of the quilt, clammy._

"_What happened?"_

"_I don't know." Her voice was a sad whisper. She raised her circled eyes to him, begging for comfort. He looked at her solemnly, rubbing his thumb in circles over her hand._

"_You should be more careful, sweetheart."_

_The endearment didn't mask the hit of accusation she heard in his voice. It took her a moment to recover from the remark; she had the feeling that it wasn't born out of concern for her person, or worry for the future of her health._

"_It isn't—it isn't my fault, Will." She whispered, her shoulders shaking with the force of holding back more tears. The thought of his—of his blaming her…_

"_I didn't—I wasn't saying. Elizabeth. You misunderstood."_

"_You sound like you're blaming me." Her voice was soft and hurt. She met his eyes and then looked away quickly, odd thoughts starting to form in her head._

"_You're being ridiculous." He said. "You're just tired. Next time, Elizabeth. Next time you just won't be so careless."_

_He didn't know how much his incriminating words crushed her._

Elizabeth let the chair slam to the floor and threw the apple across the room, desperately hoping for it to hit something that would break with a shatter and a crash. It was one of the more benign memories, but it was no less like a blunt knife carving through skin to get to the heart. It had been before she'd begun to see it. The edges had just started to fray when he said those words and after that the fabric began to rip and the wholes showed everything and sorrow and grief and hate. The first loss of innocence. The rudest awakening. An inexplicable loss that was nobody's fault until he had turned it into an excuse. _I can't take it anymore, Elizabeth._

If I have to hear his voice in my head one more _FUCKING_ time…

She wasn't actually aware that she'd hissed the words aloud until Jack grabbed her wrist and wrestled the bottle from her raised hand, obviously in fear for its life.

"Hearing voices in yer head, Miss Swann?" he asked coolly, setting the bottle down far on the other side of the table and out of her destructive reach. "Ye seem to have a fetish for doing harm to me alcohol stores." He added, referencing the--in his opinion--fiasco on Rum Runners Isle.

"That bottle you adore so much will collide with _your_ bloody head if you sneak up on me like that again." She lashed out without thinking, what she only assumed was a _fetching_ snarl gracing her face. He seemed surprised for only a moment at her outburst and cleared his throat.

"'M not much of a psychiatrist, but I'd hazard a guess that ye've got something uncomfortable stuck up yer arse, love." He fired back, in possibly the most carefree, friendly form of sarcasm she'd ever heard spoken by human lips. How was it possibly to sound that frightfully charming while delivering an insult? She almost stuck her tongue out at him. Instead, she opted for another expletive.

"Bastard."

"Music to me ears."

She glared at him over folded arms and slowly turned in the chair, taking back the rum bottle that he actually had not placed out of arms reach. He watched her with a raised brow that indicated mild surprise at her behavior. She ignored his stare, letting copious amounts of alcohol burn down her throat, still reeling from the memory that had just accosted her. He watched her for a minute and then walked across the room the back of the cabin, kicked open a trunk, and deposited his coat in it, leaving him in his v-necked shirt, still ruffling through something.

"You know, by means of fleeting observation and certain rumors gleaned from the Tortuga elite, I'd wager a guess that you've had a complete change of personality." He turned around with another bottle in hand, gauging her reaction. She toasted him sardonically.

"Isn't that the discovery of the bloody century."

"You've acquired a rather colorful vocabulary." He pointed out unnecessarily.

"Should I clean it up for your highness or would you rather sod off and allow me to continue my conversation with myself?" she heard her words and almost succeeded in surprising herself at the outright bitchiness. Almost.

"I'm interested to meet the you that's making _you_ angry enough to inflict damage on me innocently bystanding bottles of rum."

She wasn't actually sure that merited a snarky reply or not. She covered the silence, and the—for some reason—laughter bubbling in her throat, by pouring more rum into her mouth and waited for his next jab. The angrier he made her, the safer she was. Anger was her friend.

"Did you eat?"

"Why'd you bring me with you, Jack?"

"What the hell happened, love?"

The exchange was so fast they were both left staring at each other with nothing to say, having both asked their questions at nearly the same moment. What, indeed.

Neither one of them spoke. She didn't know what his answer was and she sure as God in heaven was not going to tell him hers.

"Where am I sleeping tonight Jack?" she asked challengingly, smiling with the bottle between her teeth as she tipped it back again. She was going to drink him dry before he got the next port. That, or there was the growing possibility that she would induce someone to strangle her over the next few days.

"Where do you want to sleep, _Elizabeth_?" he answered equally, his voice patronizing.

"Which of your able-bodied crew would you consider most friendly?" she asked mockingly, blatant insinuation behind her words.

"That's enough," he snapped, slamming his own bottle down on the table next to her. She surprised herself by jumping a little at the force of it. "As amusing as I find this avant-garde act you're putting on, I'll be drawing the line at you rutting with the crew. Tha's not why I dragged you off that island."

"Why _did_ you bring me on your ship, Captain?" she repeated, turning defiant eyes up to his as he leaned down over her chair, his face hard and searching.

"I couldn't stand to see you in that bloody hole." The words came out as a growl.

"How thoughtful." She sighed sarcastically, almost regretting the tone she used as a reflex. Why did it bother him so much? She was someone who'd been a moment in his life years and years ago, who at that had done nothing but cause problems and get in his way with her foolishness. Still, she looked at him with a little less mockery and didn't get up.

"Yer sleepin' in here." he said with finality, shoving off from the table and turning around, snatching his compass from the far end of the table as he stepped back. She hadn't even noticed the thing there.

"I suppose sleeping with the captain is to be considered an honor?" She couldn't stop the words that came out of her mouth; she'd just been so conditioned to quick, protective remarks that hid everything. That habit wasn't changing anytime soon, and that guard wasn't coming down. Not on her watch. "Thank you." She added as an afterthought. He grunted in response.

"See you've taken to drinking the rum rather than burning it." He commented, an edge still present in his voice.

"Are you trying to make conversation Captain Sparrow?" she asked bluntly, twirling a lock of hair around her index finger and letting it spiral down her shoulder. "Because it's not a required commodity. Feel free to leave me to myself." There was the acidic quality again. She didn't know if she wanted him to leave or if she wanted him to kiss her again.

"I prefer to stay on and continue our little game of verbal abuse." He replied evenly, tossing the compass up and, upon catching it, hooking it onto his belt. "There's that, and the nagging inkling I have that it would be less-than-smart to leave you," he jerked her wrist up suddenly and jammed down the sleeve, revealing not only the recent cigarette burn but a serious of thin, red scars up to her elbow. "by yourself." he finished with a snarl, pulling her out of the chair and looking closer.

Elizabeth stiffened and attempted wrenching her arm out of his grip but her clutched her tighter and twisted slightly, causing her to bit her lip from whimpering in pain.

"Are you bloody stupid?" he asked, putting his rough finger on one of the scars and tracing it. She wondered when he'd seen them, how he'd known. If things continued to go like this, it was all going to fall apart. _Again_.

"Let me go." She hissed in a low voice, her eyes threatening. She didn't dare wrestle her arm from him; it wasn't above him to break her arm keeping her still.

"Why do you do it?" he demanded, looking up from the unsightly scars and glaring at her. There was disgust in his voice but there was something else there too. Imperceptible and it reflected in the farthest reaches of his cocoa eyes. Anguish. Disappointment. Sadness? But anyone who walked in now would see only the more prominent sarcasm and anger.

Trying to get him off of her back, she graced him with possibly the most honest answer she'd given all day.

"It numbs all the other pain that's there." She said quietly. "Being able to bleed means I'm still alive." She saw the near horror in his eyes and it satisfied her. One of the most disturbing things she could have said, and maybe it would compel him to stop asking.

"That's sick," he croaked, dropping her arm. She jerked her sleeve back down and stood still and rigid, feeling naked and exposed in front of him. "You'll kill yourself." Her defiant, empty eyes gazed back at him and she responded acidly

"What a _tragedy_."

He looked as if she'd spoken in a different language. She noticed his fingers flex and he squeezed his hands into fists at his side, his knuckles turning white. Jack dug his fingernails into the padded skin of his palm. Her skin tingled and she refused the instinct the either throw something at him or bolt from the room. He was seconds away from overstepping the boundaries into dangerous territories. She saw it in his eyes. She saw him thinking and processing and guessing.

"What did he _do_ to you? What did the _bastard_ do?" he demanded, his voice low and irate. She came dangerously close to snapping. Look behind you Jack, there was the line.

"Get out." She snarled.

"Something went wrong. What did Turner—"

"GET. OUT!" she screamed, covering the name with her voice, her cheeks flushing. She lashed out at Jack, shoving him with all her might. She never should have let it get this far. He hardly stumbled at her force, and was quick enough to catch her arm as she swung it back to smack him hard across the cheek.

"I'm not the one you want to hurt." He said sharply, throwing her hand down and leaving the cabin, slamming the door behind him so the wood shuddered. Elizabeth grabbed her hair and screamed, sinking to the floor against the just-slammed door and dug her nails into her scalp, squeezing her eyes shut against the flashing images before her eyes.

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That Chapter was harder to get up. Next up are Jack's thoughts. Review, please.

Scars-- Papa Roach


	4. I Write Sins Not Tragedies

**A/N: **And here we take a look into Jack's opinion on the matter. I want to thank all my fabbbbulous reviewers who gave me some love (haha) and, surprising as it may be, my one critical reviewer, who pointed out some inetersting things and made me think. Good Job, Son of a Gun.

Read on!

* * *

**Chapter Four**

The first thing he did when he stormed out of that cabin, the slam of the door still ringing in his ears, was find that damned impossible to get rid of undead monkey and shoot it square in the head.

A scene which stunned the entire crew eating in the hold (where the scapegoat monkey had been found) into silence.

"As you where!" Jack barked, and flinched as her screaming echoed from above deck. A few of the men raised their eyes curiously to the ceiling. Jack banged his pistol against the wall of the ship and glared at them all. Slowly they went back to their eating and gambling, only Mr. Gibbs looking solemnly over one of their shoulders to probe Jack's eyes. He released the monkey violently and left the hold swiftly, having succeeded in getting rid of the urge to shoot something and satisfied that it hadn't been Elizabeth (though it eventually might be).

He had been all but kicked out of his own cabin, and he stood on the stairs glaring at the exit onto deck above him. He turned back and stomped down all the way to the depth of the ship and, busting open the crate of rum that he'd bartered for in Tortuga, sat down amongst the barrels of gunpowder and popped the cork.

He took a swig from the familiar bottle and tipped his head back against the wall, making quite a loud _thump_, and ignored the dull pain that throbbed through his skull.

Son of a bitch, what had _happened_ to that girl? That beautiful, young, spirited, brave woman? He remembered her so well because she had so captured his attention then; how many class-system princesses do you meet who'll jump in front of twenty bayonets for the most notorious pirate in the Caribbean? Most of them were all stuck-up, snobbish, so called _well_-_bred_ brain-washed bitches who wouldn't lift a finger to help a fellow human in need. He'd been highly amused standing behind her in front of all those men, she wearing only a chemise or whatever trapping undergarments those kind of girls wore, and listening to her defend him. _Pirate or not, this man saved my life! _And he didn't even know why he'd done it. Probably to escape those blundering idiots who had blockaded his smooth entry into their port. Or just because he'd been so incredibly bored. In which case, why not save a damsel from drowning. Of course, said damsel happened to have the infamous medallion tucked between her breasts. Hadn't _that_ been a fun discovery?

She'd gone on the bloody ship. Just waltzed into the middle of Barbossa's little pseudo-kingdom and demanded they leave her precious little town alone. And you had to admit, that took guts. He didn't actually want to imagine what Barbossa could have done—well, what he very well might have done, to such a painfully naïve girl.

She walked the plank without tears or complaint, even throwing one of her cutting remarks at Hector and not even giving a slight flinch at the cruel mutterings going on around her.

He recalled that island clearly, sharply in his head, no matter how drunk she'd thought he'd been. He was never as drunk as they assumed he was, and more to his advantage. Alone, on an island, with the commodore's fiancée, any numerous things could've happened if he'd just made sure she drank more than he saw her secretly pour out on the sand beside her and chosen his manipulating words carefully. But instead, he was fascinated by what she was doing—as someone who'd spent ample time in Tortuga, he could tell a truly smashed woman from one who was decidedly not drunk; Elizabeth Swann was not drunk. So instead of his usual games of seduction, he felt a keen interest to follow her rules of her game and see who came out the winner and what the ultimate goal was.

And damn it all, if she hadn't succeeded in getting them off that island quicker than he had the first time.

In the darkness of the ship's storage, the last place where the captain of this fine vessel should be, he knew exactly why she captivated and drew his thoughts so annoyingly much. He thought of himself when he saw her, all those years ago, determined to through off a mantle that had been cast on her by birth, daring enough to try and show them all that she was going to do whatever the hell she pleased, that she was going to entice the Commodore to further her means and charm everyone in her path until they saw her as completely innocent. But she had been. She had been so innocent and so untouched by the caprice of the world and he'd somehow seen that through all the pride and bravado she fronted and he wanted to keep her that way. Because he had been there. He had joined up the army, signed with the East India Trading Company with visions of grandeur and thoughts of being a hero, swearing not to become the filthy pirate his father had been. And then there's been the ghastly sigh of human bondage he'd come across in the holds of the Wicked Wench and he saw the Company stripped of its glory and freed them all, cost Cutler Beckett thousands. And in that one act of good will he'd been branded as a pirate and became exactly the man he hated. But he had been like her. She had been so clever; he saw in here the willingness to accept the questionable means if the end benefited well, while her stuffy self-righteously moral blacksmith counterpart would take only the high road. She was calculating. And she had had the most beautiful smile he'd ever seen; one that lit up her eyes and her entire complexion. He remembered asking Gibbs about her after she'd recognized him with shock on the ship, and the things he'd told her about knowing the Swann girl as a child. _Curious little lass. Loved the Blackbeard stories, she did. _He'd never seen this in her future. He'd never wanted to find her in the ultimate despair she drowned in now.

Jack brought the top of the bottle to his forehead and pressed against it, closing his eyes and shaking his head. _Incomprehensible_. Elizabeth was all but destroyed. Speaking metaphorically, that is, the Elizabeth of past acquaintance was changed into this unrecognizable hardened—well, to put it bluntly—harlot. Though he threw those words from all his descriptions of her character as quickly as possible, completely unwilling to associate that vulgarity with Elizabeth Swann, the fact remained that she _was_. _And a damn good one at that._

He tapped the bottle against his temple violently. _That_ particular recollection was the most forbidden pleasure mixed with disgust and, well, almost shame. No matter how many times he conjured up images of her naked, or fantasized about her in his bed (or naked on the sand, wherever he happened to be at the moment) he'd never actually thought he'd ever experience those…favors. Though knowing what he did about the tight British society hierarchy she'd been brought up in he rather doubted anyone would.

Obviously, he did have the human failing of sometimes thinking _wrong_.

Very wrong, in this certain affair. He almost drained the rest of the rum from the bottle, trying to bring some sort of clarity to the entire puzzling situation. Elizabeth, still styling herself under her maiden name, working in a tavern in Tortuga—according to whispers and Madame, the apparent _best_ in Tortuga—unsmiling, bitter, and with an aversion to hearing William Turner's name. And wasn't that just the most curious turn of events of all, when previously her girlish thoughts had been bothered about nothing but how she was going to attract that dense eunuch's attention. Which focused his attention on that aspect of the possible influences of what seemed to be her sudden schizophrenia.

He was unaware of what had unfolded after his…artistic departure from Port Royal and ultimately the hangman's noose. Jack didn't know if she'd married Turner or if she'd followed through on her ill-made promise and married that peacock Norrington and carried on some kind of badly-ended clandestine affair with the blacksmith. What he could glean from her behavior and harpy-like reaction to his openly accusing Turner in the cabin was that her rose-coloured glasses had broken and the initial view of young William (and the world in itself) had been shaken to the core. In other words, she'd grown up. The hard way. But yet, it was near impossible to construct any theory on what could have possibly happened that was this devastating. Much as he held Turner's holier-than-though attitude in contempt, he couldn't see in him any inclination to abuse, not after knowing the man's father for years on end. Bootstrap hadn't been one for child-rearing, hadn't been around much as far as Jack knew, but he did know how to treat that woman he up and married out of the blue. Of course, one had to remember that even the closes friends of people couldn't always see the darkest aspects of their person. Everyone had secrets; some were just infinitely better at hiding them. Abuse? There was the possibility of Turner's death; but she hardly seemed the kind of person to let grief so completely destroy her life. Blast it. It was all a maddening maze of dead ends.

Emptying the bottle, Jack got up from the floor and threw it down beside him, for the time being washing his hands of her mystifying insanity. He found his way back on deck, where at least half of the crew had reappeared from dinner. Though the bunch of lazy insubordinate bilge rats were doing absolutely nothing productive. It was dark now; the stars were brightly visible in the sky, so much more clear out here on the ocean than anywhere else on the planet. Infinitely more beautiful. It was quiet but for the slow murmur of men talking and swishy rolling of the ocean. Enough to clear even the most troubled mind. He had the sudden inclination to drag her spiteful ass out here and tie her down until she appreciated every sparkling light in the sky.

Actually, that wasn't a bad idea.

He marched purposely over to the cabin, shouldering Cotton and his disturbing parrot out of the way as he passed. He contemplated knocking for a split second then thought to hell with it; he wasn't knocking on his own cabin and giving her the opportunity to send him away. He just opened the door and walked in—

--to find her asleep on the bed. At that, he nudged the door shut with his foot, not wanting any of the crew to look in and see a woman sprawled on a bed. He looked over at the table; the plate of food had been upended and thrown to the floor, no doubt by her majesty the queen of throwing breakable objects. He moved closer to the bed and looked over her. The dress was hanging off her shoulder again, in the usual style he'd seen worn before by countless other women. Her eyes was closed but her slumber looked anything but peaceful; her lips were parted and her brows were knotted together in the middle. Strands of hair were slanted over her lips and the side of her cheek. He didn't dare touch her, because he had an inkling that when she did sleep it was much needed and light and he didn't want to risk waking her up and having her scream like a banshee and set the whole crew off demanding he explain to them whatever rumor they'd started circulating among themselves. No doubt that he'd brought his favorite whore along on a whim and wasn't going to share. Wasn't that thought a breeding ground for mutiny.

His eyes fell over her and he looked judgingly, with the ironic thoughts that he really had no right to be judging anyone. Her one arm was stretched out, the sheet tangled in her fingers, looking as if she'd drawn it into her grasp and pulled. His sight was suddenly arrested by her other wrist, facing up with the fingers curled in a slight fist, resting on her thigh. There was a thin smear of dark reddish-brown blood staining her skin there. He looked again to her face; she wasn't pale, her chest rose and fell normally; not unconscious. Sleeping. He forgot his initial reluctance to touch her and reached for her hand, picking it up gingerly and holding it in his own, wanting to inspect the self-inflicted wound at closer range.

He touched the scar with his finger and put pressure on it slightly, and almost the instant he touched it she gave a strangled gasp and twisted out of his grip, sitting up and scrambling back against the head of the bed, her eyes wild and her breathing quick, looking completely lost.

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--Again, I want to remind you to **PLEASE** reveiw. It's very nice :)

-"I Write Sins Not Trageides" by Panic! At the Disco (may need a little background, but ask me if you're curious)


	5. Fix You

**A/N: **Again, thanks to all the lovely reviews, and a special nod to **royalpinkdogs **for offering to be my beta, lets give her a round of applause. This chapter was initially going to be longer, but it wasn't flowing well after a certain point and I decided not to force it. Enjoy!

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**Chapter Five: Fix You**

In a split second he realized she had no idea where she was. Her coppery eyes focused on him and she took a deep, shuddering breath, regulating her quick breaths back to normal. She touched her wrist unconsciously, running her own finger over the rigid scar there, and he saw her jaw tighten as she swallowed hard; she blinked swiftly but he had a keen enough eye to catch the glaze of tears she was jerking back.

"Elizabeth," he started gently, momentarily regretting the harsh words they'd been throwing about lately. He stepped forward and reached out to touch her knuckles where her hand was clutched around her wrist.

She moved her wrist away and a pulled her legs up to her chest, pressing her knees together. She put her head down, resting her temple against her kneecaps, and wrapped her arms around herself. Her shoulders were shaking imperceptibly, but he couldn't tell if she was crying her or not.

God, he just wanted to know what was _wrong_. Devil knows he knew what it was like to be afraid to close your eyes at night for fear of being plagued by nightmares. But he couldn't figure this out; he was at a loss as to what was still eating at her. She couldn't escape from her demons even in her wakeful state. He reached out with a rough, ringed hand and pulled her hair back from its shielding curtain and tucked it behind her ear. She flinched sharply at the motion but he caught her injured hand before she could move and pulled it to him; she lifted her head. Her eyes weren't red; there were no tear streaks on her rouged cheeks, but her kohl-lined eyes were smudged just a little. He chose the wiser option here and tactfully ignored that. When he found her eyes again, they were cool again, but her mouth wasn't set in its hard, unforgiving line. Her hair was a little disheveled, as the sleeping had mussed it, but it fell no less beautifully around her shoulders. She was looking at him blankly, with expressionless features, as if bracing herself against his remarks and chalking up her own. Her jerking around and squeezing her wrist so tightly had re-opened the cut, and blood was smearing across her wrist again, wet and slick. He held it up dismally.

"Convince you you're alive, love?" he asked grimly, setting her wrist gently on the pillow again. He turned around and pulled a leather pouch off a shelf, searching out a vial of clean alcohol and something he'd bought off a medicine woman in Aruba that seemed to close up wounds unusually fast. She was watching him with eyes that bordered on distrusting when he turned around, prompting him to hold up the items in front of him as if he'd been caught red-handed stealing. She didn't move, and he set the things on the bed, uncorking the stopped from the vial and carelessly ripping a piece of cloth from the bed sheet to saturate with the alcohol. He glanced up at her swiftly before he pressed it to the cut; she flinched again, and he couldn't help the words that came out of his mouth:

"Does that hurt enough?" Maybe it was cruel, it was definitely uncalled for, but he couldn't deny that she needed it. He'd never seen such reckless intent on self-destruction. Moments after he called her out on her stupid outcry she picks up the nearest sharp object and gouges herself with it? He had half a mind to cuff her to him and drag her around the ship kicking and screaming to prevent her from killing herself. She frustrated him to no end, with her chilling refusal to wake up to reality and her through-and-through apparent hate of all humanity and aversion to any contact from people. She was showing herself more and more to be a lost cause, and much as he was one to drop a hopeless cause without a second glance, she was one chance he wasn't going to give up on if it meant beating her senseless to get this out of her. Whatever it was, it was killing her.

He didn't look up at her reaction while he used his finger to spread the ointment over the cut. He touched some to the recent cigarette burn as well, noticing her curl her fingers against the burn out of the corner of his eye. The other scars he didn't bother with; they were old, they would be permanent. When he corked the vial and the ointment, he returned her arm to her and looked up with scrutinizing eyes. She wasn't looking at him, but down at her wrist; he couldn't see her eyes to try and pull any information from them.

"What did you do it with?" he asked sharply, needing to break the silence and determined to get it away from her all the same. She looked up slowly, and he anticipated the sharp retort.

"Why do you care?" She asked in a low voice, not quite as menacing as she had been before. He was tempted to slap some sense into her. She could anger her so much with this uncanny stubbornness but she invoked such pity in him—wouldn't she hate him for _that_, if she knew?

"Is it so hard to believe that I don't want you dead?" he asked tensely, the statement ringing warning bells in his head as being way too revealing of his not-so-roguish side. She was looking at him almost scathingly, her eyes were slanted; he could see her mulling it over in his head. Suddenly she straightened her head up and looked at him evenly.

"Do you mean that?" she asked, surprising him with the simplicity of the question. Is that what she wanted? _Assurance_? Knowledge that there was someone who actually cared about her mortality? As emotionally unacsessible as he was, Jack could give her that easily. There were plenty of people he didn't want dead. What he couldn't tell her was just how much seeing her pale and cold would affect him. He nodded, without taking his eyes off of hers.

Elizabeth reached up slowly and took the gold earrings from her ears, and removed two pins from the bodice of her dress. She dropped them into his outstretched hand and gave him a look that seemed to say, _are you happy? _He squeezed his hand shut, ignoring the stabbing of the unclosed pin against the soft pads of his fingertips. She took note of the paleness in his face. She wanted to scream at herself for telling him. For letting him gain that much ground over her as to take her only means of release. What was he _doing_? Jack glanced down at his hand, resolving to throw the offending items over the side of the _Pearl_ the instant he was away. He started to turn away, to set them on the table, when her voice stopped him.

"I can't stop doing it." She said.

He dropped the injury-inflicting things into his coat pocket and turned around, unable to stop the eyebrow he raised in question. Couldn't stop? Like it was an addiction? He didn't know whether to surrender her to madness or give her another really strong drink.

"What did you say?" he asked quietly, glaring at her. She didn't look away from him, but she seemed smaller in his eyes. She still looked at him with ferocity in her features, and he couldn't see any vulnerability or emotion that gave away why she'd told him something so…revealing. A second longer of looking at her told him she wasn't going to repeat herself. He groaned inwardly and sat down on the bed facing her, pulling one leg up and resting it at a triangular angle from his body.

"Elizabeth," he stopped briefly, trying to extract the patronizing tone from his voice. "It is mind-boggling to me that you would intentionally inflict pain upon your person so as to," he couldn't help it. His tone was anything but neutral. "_watch_ yourself bleed."

Elizabeth's shoulders were stiff and her back was rigid against the headboard. She wasn't comfortable with him that close to her, and he could sense it. He couldn't fathom why either, as earlier she hadn't seemed to be uncomfortable around anyone; she'd been busy seducing them. Then, he had obviously caught her in a bad moment, and even though he could tell she wanted him to leave and he knew she was going to start throwing obscenities around soon, he wasn't really planning on leaving. It was night. The ocean was calm. He didn't have anywhere to be.

"I told you," she started, through gritted teeth. Her knuckles were white; she was gripping the sheets on both sides of her legs. "It helps."

Jack rolled his eyes to the ceiling and put his hand over his face in exasperation.

"It helps with what? _What_ can you possible fix by—by _cutting_ yourself? I think ye 'ave lost yer bloody mind, Lizzie, because damn it all if I can't figure out what's wrong with ye—"

"There's nothing wrong with me!" he barely gave her warning voice time to interrupt.

"There's about a thousand things wrong here, _miss, _and I don't think it's anything a good bashing of yer head against a wall would fix." He had raised his voice after her interruption, the words rough and cutting, and he wasn't really aware if they had stunned her or angered her or both.

"I'm not mad. I haven't lost my mind." She said quietly, glaring at him with silent anger. That accusation was getting to her, and she showed it. Cruel as it may seem, he was going to have to break down her defenses, and it seemed he'd found a way to do that. Find the weak spots and fray the edges.

"Then you have a colossal misconception of the definition of sanity." Jack stopped the venom for a moment to look over her, and continued with a softened determinedness. "You're a smart lass, Elizabeth. Don't pretend you don't have any clue what yer doing to yerself. I don't have a bloody clue what happened to mess you up so bad but I never thought I'd see the day when you'd pull such an asinine stunt—"

She'd almost leapt forward suddenly, on all fours, and her face was inches from his, her eyes blazing and the muscles in her face and around her lips taut.

"You have no right." She growled lividly, her eyes dark. He didn't move back from her, just looked back at her with a mild gaze, waiting for the expected mood-swing. "You don't understand. You don't know _anything."_

"Would it kill you to let me in on that sacred little enigma?" he asked, sarcasm dripping from his words like honey.

"Fuck you!" she snarled, reaching behind his head and grabbing his hair, holding his eyes on her. If he'd really wanted to pull away, she could have had broken bones in an instant, but he stayed put for the time being. "Did you bring me with you to play games? To amuse yourself? Do you find me _entertaining_? Oh, I can be entertaining, _Jack_, if that's what you want, I'm good at that. But if you brought me here on some whim, following that save-the-damsel complex all you men seem to possess; if you brought me here to find out what could have possibly cause pristine little Miss Swann to have a complete change of character, then I _hate_ you for that. You sit there, in all your self-righteousness, as if I'm in need of guidance, as if you _saved_ me—and I, Captain Sparrow, do not rescuing from the likes of you." And she jerked his head forward and met his lips with hers.

He could taste the desperation in her kiss. She wanted the conversation over, she wanted him to stop, and the devilish woman knew exactly how to distract him. She was digging her nails into the back of his head, and shifted her weight onto his lap. He grasped her small waist in his hands and moved her back, moving one hand up to hold her head the way she was holding his. Her eyes were blazing brightly, whether with anger or suppressed tears he didn't know, but she tried to shake him off and put her other hand on his neck.

"Is this how you're going to fix it?" he asked sharply.

"Stop acting like you disapprove." She gave back bitterly. "Stop acting like I need to be fixed." She pressed her nail against the tender flash beneath his ear. "And stop pretending you care." He grabbed her hand away from his ear and held it tightly, willing the blood to stay in his head. She pushed him back and straddled his hips. She leaned forward, her hair fell over to one side, all the curls spilling down and covering his shoulder. "You know it's all easier this way." She said in a low voice, coaxingly. "If you just _shut_-_up_." The last words came out as an annoyed hiss, and she bent down to attack his mouth again. He placed his hands on her knees and moved them up her thighs under her dress; she pressed her mouth harder against his, her tongue running along his bottom lip.

If this was what she needed, if this was what would stop her from slicing open her skin and watching her blood drip out of her, he could provide this for the time being.

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I again, remind you to please **Review**

**--**I'll hopefully have Chapter 6 up in the next week or so, but Cross Country practice has started so updates may be a longer wait.

-- 'Fix You' by Coldplay


	6. Straightjacket

**A/N: **If you have already read this story, then this chapter has been edited, and the mistakes fixed by my lovely beta. If you are new, please enjoy, and REVIEW.

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**Chapter Six: Straightjacket **

It had been a week. The constant mind games were starting to crack her.

Elizabeth was perched on the starboard side of the _Black_ _Pearl_, with a needle between her teeth, her mind focused on repairing the rope that bound the anchor to the ship. An inventory of supplies had revealed the middle of it to be faulty, and with the aid of the needle and a bit of spare rope, she was sewing and rebraiding the repairs into said rope, in order to prevent a mishap should they need to lay anchor anytime soon. Although this was no menial task, she as concentrating far more brain power on this piece of rope than any sane human being ever would, just to take her mind off the ship's infuriating Captain.

The Captain was the source of the mind games and silent battles she was determined to end with herself as the victor. But Mr. Sparrow proved to be a thousand times more maddeningly relentless than she could have possibly imagined—in fact, ironically enough, it was safe to conjecture that she'd finally met her match. This ongoing silent war that he had deliberately started proved more vicious than either could have foreseen, as his way of attempting to get her to talk was to allow perfectly alienating things to come out of his mouth and expect her to let her guard down. And the impossible man really had not learned the appropriate moment to _shut his_ _mouth_—which inevitably resulted in either a screaming match or a hard smack across the face. And still, she would sit in the dark afterwards and wonder why he was trying so hard to pull this out of her, and she would try to discern what emotion she kept seeing flare up in his eyes that would be gone the second he blinked. She couldn't figure him out. And it was all swirling around in her head and colliding with everything else and succeeding in slowly driving her mad.

The crew. There was the crew. As much as she preferred distancing herself from everyone and getting the point across that she was inaccessibly cold, she couldn't help taking pleasure in the company of the select few she'd know previously.. Mr. Gibbs, for one, she could hardly avoid, as he had such a fatherly quality to him, and she keenly remembered his gory stories about piracy from her childhood. He'd never treated her like she was made of glass, not even when she'd been a child of ten, and now, though she saw sadness and a curiosity in his wrinkled eyes when he looked at her, he proved a comfort to be around when Jack was being particularly annoying. That, and she highly respected him for always giving her a job to do—something he had at first neglected, whether she was a woman or because of her attitude, she didn't know—but had changed his game when she looked at him after a day or two and blankly told him that if he didn't give her something to do she was going to busy herself with the murder of Jack Sparrow. He seemed to sympathize with that feeling.

But there were some of the crew who were decidedly not so friendly. Not to say that anyone was abusive or any truly atrocious thing like that, but she could tell that her presence was a cause for caution and temptation, and she could sense a certain disgruntled way about some when they figured out just where their unplanned passenger did her sleeping. They joked about her in the holds, or at night when they didn't know she was watching the sea from the high deck, cloaked in shadow and listening to their talk. She was the captain's whore, his personal slut that he'd brought along on a whim. They leered at her sometimes in the hold; she'd heard them making bets as to who could get her in their hammock first. She couldn't really blame any of them for that, and her feelings were hardly affected by their slurs and jeers. She, in her decidedly immodest attire and the seductive manner that stuck with her from Tortuga, had to own to a bit of teasing. There were a few crew members who were better looking than others, some that were more mentally equipped and provided a better conversation. Then, there were the vulgar few who, though apparently witless, she had to tread carefully around because, even though she wasn't exactly a helpless damsel, they could quite easily over power her and she wasn't in the mood to add rape to the list of grievances in her mind. But, faced with the ever present choice of spending her time learning games and gambling with the assortment of men or pitting herself against Jack and coming dangerously close to losing control of everything, she gladly chose to slum with the crew.

But those whispers. _Captains_ _whore_. Whispers, assumptions. They got to her. And not because she was offended at being called a whore or the like, she hardly objected to that. All she could do at a supposed insult like that was raise an eyebrow and give an inward, derisive snort, as it glanced off her skin with hardly a nick. The vulgar allusions to her liaison with Jack didn't faze her either, let them talk, let them share their crude stories of what so-and-so had supposedly heard or seen. It was more…complicated than that. No, it wasn't the insults or the vulgarity that bothered her, it was the insinuation and the nagging that they caused in the confines of her mind.

Why had he brought her on his ship? What had possessed him to whisk her away in the secret of night from a tavern in Tortuga and set himself up as her proverbial savior? She could not, no matter how hard much she dissected his every word and studied his face and his movements, figure out what had sparked his unusual whim. In his attempts to draw her out of herself, to get her to tell him what had—in his words—caused her to scatter her marbles to the four corners of the earth, she could sense real concern in him, and under his biting words and immature whining fits, she sometimes started to believe that he wanted to help her. She almost saw in him a sort of desperate want to smooth out her jagged edges and an actual softness. But these words, these behind-the-hand whispers, they were a parasite in her mind that angered her when they made her think of other motives he might have had. She wasn't any fool; she knew very well that had the opportunity presented itself years ago he would have hardly hesitated in seducing her. This parasite planted the thoughts in her head that it was quite possible that Jack had simply seen a new opportunity and actually had sought to make her his private whore. And that particular thought, when she dwelt on it, made her so irate that woe be the individual who interrupted her reflections on the matter. It wasn't that she found being the mistress of a man degrading, nor was she hurt by any shred of indifference in Jack; she was far beyond having scruples and she didn't care if Jack was a scheming bastard or not—what did bother her was the possibility that she was his good little whore. In essence, she was, but that was of her own choice to get him to shut up when he started his self-righteous rescuer crusade. No, if it was her doing, she had no qualms about her sinful cavorting with the pirate, but if officially considered as belonging to him, she'd be damned if she was doing it for free.

Elizabeth removed the needle from between her lips and jammed it into the middle of the rope with brute force, taking her inner anger out on the innocent object since the offending captain was not around to bear the brunt of it. Her eyes moved to her wrist as she quickly laced the needle in and out of the rope, examining the fading cigarette burn and cut above it. Both were almost invisible now, the burn a shrinking brown circle and the cut a thin red line only visible if one squinted. Whatever he had put on the injuries had almost hidden them to scrutinizing eyes, and she found herself wishing his odd assortment of ointments and such could somehow hide the others that criss-crossed up her arm. Those today were covered by a simpler dress with loose sleeves that fluttered a little above her elbow and came to rest high on her thighs when she sat down. The dress had annoyed Jack when she defiantly put it on in the morning. He had accused her of spiting him and toying with the entire crew. To which she scathingly replied that she didn't fancy sweating under a ton of heavy clothing and stormed out of the cabin.

With a tired sigh, Elizabeth laid the rope and needle aside and leaned back on the edge of the ship, supporting herself with one arm stretched out behind her and staring out over the vast ocean. She wasn't afraid of falling, even with the slow rocking of the ship she had good balance and was so perched that she could easily hop on deck if it should decide to tilt the wrong direction. The cool breeze stirred her hair around her face and she tucked it behind her ear with her other hand, feeling suddenly exhausted from all the stress.

He didn't know how much his persistence was wearing her resolve to the ground. She was finding it harder and harder to hold her own in their sparring matches. Her sarcastic comments and derisive barbs where automatic, she didn't have to think to keep up in that department, but she did have to fight to keep her eyes dry and her face covered with an ironic smirk of some sort, or risk revealing a bit of the turmoil to him. And god knows she didn't want to dredge it all up again. Not when finally, finally, she'd confined the heartbreak to her nightmares. Vulnerability was not an option, tears were not a luxury, and he, Jack and his endless pestering and probing eyes, he was burrowing into the cracks and threatening to undo everything she'd worked so diligently to beat down.

Her eyes glazed over as she picked over her ruminations, and the shouts and noises from the ship around her melted together. Memories surfaced and images swam before her eyes and she swallowed hard, clenching her teeth. She didn't want to relive them now. She dug her nails into the side of the ship. She could hear his voice in her head, hear him saying her name in all his different tones. She wanted to tear at her ears until his grating voice couldn't penetrate her anymore.

'_Do you ever regret marrying me?'_

'_Why do you look at me like that?'_

'_You never come home anymore! You stay in that forge half the night!'_

'_I can never give you what you deserve.'_

'_I love you! That's all that matters!_

'_Stop!'_

'_Why are you doing this to us? You're tearing us apart.'_

'_You're spoiled, you always have been.'_

'_Will!'_

Words, anguish, fighting. Precious illusions.

She just wanted it to stop. Suddenly, she just wanted to close her eyes and get rid of it all. She wanted to scream. Strangely enough, for the first time in a little less than five painful years, she wanted to cry. _Jack_.

This was what he was doing to her.


	7. Our Lady of Sorrows

**A/N: Sorry its been a short while, I had more trouble hashing out this chapter than the last. Of course, as usualy, thanks to the lovely royalpinkdogs for being my beta (and boosting my ego marvelously). **

**Also, a quick request. REVIEWS. I heartily appreciate the lovely reviews i receive, but with all the hits I'm getting, I should have more. So please, reveiw. Drop a line. Give some feedback. It helps. **

**Enjoy.**

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**Chapter Seven: Our Lady of Sorrows**

Jack leaned back in his chair, balancing himself with one foot braced against the edge of the table full of maps and crumpled slips of paper. Bottle in hand, he set his hat on the table in front of him and glanced across the room to the bed where she was sleeping. He kept his probing eyes on her as he took a swig of rum, and licked his lips absently. For the first time in a very long time, Jack Sparrow was watching a woman sleep.

She hardly ever slept. He knew it. It was as if she slept with one eye open; if she seemed in the hold of slumber when he walked in, she was awake instantly, fixing him with her piercing, cold gaze. There was a constant darkness under her eyes, and a pale look about her. She seemed afraid to fall asleep. Even after their sudden, often angry and heated trysts between the sheets she left, sometimes without a word, as if it was all a game. A distraction.

She hadn't left this time. Hadn't looked at him, either, but at least it was a step forward. He didn't remember her falling asleep, just the sudden realization that she was still there, and fast asleep, with her hair spread out over the pillow and her head pillowed on her arm. Exhaustion had finally caught up with her. She hadn't stirred when he got up to prowl around the ship for a final night look, still she was asleep when he'd come back in. She was really sleeping, not the light, jumpy sleep she'd flickered nervously in and out of lately, but a sleep where she looked relaxed and peaceful. Almost.

He couldn't see peace in her. He couldn't see happiness or optimism. He couldn't even see _her_ anymore, through the opaque glass shields she built up around her. She was just an enigma he couldn't figure out, due to the hard-to-overcome distraction technique she used when she, as he saw it, started to feel trapped. She fought with him and raged against him and seemed to take vindictive pleasure in contests of who could possibly say the harshest words before they reached the inevitable end with a pretty damn good fuck. She was unfathomable.

He couldn't even begin to grasp what went on her head. She was simultaneously the most tempting, irrational, enticing, infuriating woman he'd ever met. He'd always, even before, in the days when her eyes had been turned to the heavens with that sickeningly soppy look of girlish infatuation, seen that fire in her personality. She'd possessed a calculating cleverness that was rare in women of the aristocracy; absent in her was the quality of docile nursemaid to a rich bridegroom. She had a sharp, observant eye—he'd found her watching him often when he was speaking ,negotiating, as if she knew that though the others may take his promises of deliverance from Barbossa seriously, there was something that needed to be watched. Maybe she was the reason he had made it a point to keep closer to his word than usual, if not just for the fact that Will was his good friend's son.

Jack reached his hand down to his belt and unclipped the wooden compass, running his fingers over it familiarly as he held it in his palm. _A compass that doesn't work._ To the contrary, Master Norrington. Just not in the generally acknowledged fashion of working compasses. He caught the compass by its string and held it flat in his palm, holding it at eye level, regarding it with near dislike. Traitorous thing.

His compass was one of curious propensity. It didn't point north, but that trifling fact hardly meant it was broken. The compass had served him well; it was ancient, of unknown origins, bartered from an island witch-woman. He'd wager that it wasn't of this world. The compass—incomprehensibly connected to the holder's thoughts and subconscious—once opened pointed not in the determined direction that all _useful_ compasses commonly point, but in the direction of the thing the bearer wanted most. And for a pirate, a trinket like that was as valuable as life itself; all one had to do was focus his thoughts on the treasure, the legend he wished to discover, and the compass led the way. Seek and ye shall find. It contributed to half the enigma of the dashing Captain Sparrow; it was the answer to the mystery surrounding his discovery of the infamous Isla de Muerta—and it was the most frustrating _bloody_ object he'd ever laid eyes on.

It had always been straightforward. He always knew what he wanted, and whatever legend or destination he was after, the compass had provided an instant guide—handy because it meant no bartering for a map or information. And it suddenly didn't _work_. Or so he vehemently insisted in his head. The needle wouldn't focus. They'd hardly had legitimate heading. The compass swiveled around uncertainly, occasionally focusing on a fixed point, and the one time he had thrown caution to the changing winds and decided to find out what the sodding object's problem was, they'd ended up in Tortuga. This gave him a sneaking, strongly unacceptable suspicion of what exactly his subconscious mind wanted most.

He took another drink, squinted his eyes, and thumbed open the compass, closing one eye and looking at it warily. The silver needle twitched, spinning slowly in a circle, pointing briefly in one direction, then another. In a moment it jerked sharply and settled on a point. He counted five seconds of stillness before slowly looking up and following the needle's tell-tale line to Elizabeth's sleeping figure in the bed. He resisted the urge to groan, and settled for a quiet sigh instead. _She_ was more trouble than she was worth.

He was still glaring dubiously at the compass when she jerked suddenly in her sleep. She made a quiet, shaky, gasping noise and whimpered. Jack was alert instantly; he lowered the compass from his face a bit and titled his head to look at her. She was shifting in the bed, slowly raising herself up on unsteady arms.

"Lizzie?" he grunted, eyeing her closely. She looked over at him when she heard her name. He shut the compass and set it on the table as he got up, letting his chair fall carelessly to the floor and leaving the bottle next to the compass. She looked disoriented and lost, and she turned her eyes up to him as he came up near bedside. Her eyes were dark and still filled with whatever had awakened her from her sleep, vulnerability written across her face. Her hair was tumbling down one shoulder, the tendrils around her face wet with sweat, her skin was pale and he swore he found tears in her eyes. He reached out with hesitant fingers and brushed them against her shoulder.

"Don't," she whispered quietly, her voice barely steady. "Don't, Jack." But she sounded so hurt and confused that he brushed her words away and hardly acknowledged that she had spoken. His hand spread out over her clammy cheek and he slipped it behind her head, pulling her hair into a fist. He fixed her with a penetrating stare.

"Elizabeth," he pleaded softly. Her eyes fluttered weakly and he sat down on the bed near her bended knees and pulled her against him, snaking his arm around her waist and securing her lithe form against his chest. Her body, so warm and fragile to him, was stiff in his arms, but she didn't pull back. He didn't know if she was too surprised to react, by his uncharacteristically, rash movement, but he could feel the intense coil of everyone of her muscles beneath her skin, clenched tight and rigid. He put his hand against her neck, two of his fingers pressing against her cheek, below her ear, trying to feel some semblance of emotion in her skin. She made a soft choking noise in the back of her throat and her head collapsed against his shoulder, her forehead nestled at his neck, and he felt her cheek moving beneath his hand, as if her lips were moving.

"Love," he coaxed softly, with an underlying hint of warning to his quiet tone. He could feel it in her muscles; he wanted her to break. It was the rarest of feelings, Jack Sparrow _wanting_ a woman to cry. But she needed this. And he…he needed it too, in a way. Anything that made her stop.

"Make it stop," her voice broke at the end, fragile already, in a flood of raw emotion she'd kept chained tight in some dark recess of her mind. Her crying was harsh, violent, though he could feel her holding back. She was still afraid of him or herself or her demons—whatever was poisoning her nightmares. He knotted his fingers tighter in her hair and rested his chin on the crown of her head, closing his eyes. Her shoulders shook, his hand was catching her tears as they fell fast against it, one of her hands was splayed across his shoulder, pressing hard against his bicep. The other was pinned between his side and hers, the fingers curled and pressing tightly against his ribs.

He pressed his fingertips against her scalp, grasping at memories for some kind of soothing motion to comfort her, if possible. It seemed almost as if she was still shackled in her dream world; she was in hysterics but not in any way he'd seen before, she wasn't wild or violent, she just _cried _and shivered, her shaking somewhat steadied by the firm grasp of his arms. He breathed in the scent of her tousled hair and pulled her closer, so that one of her legs was over his lap. _Make it stop. _He didn't understand the meaning behind her whispered plea, he could only grasp at the strings of hypothesis, and wonder what had been the final straw that broke her façade. Wonder what had been the cause of the façade in the first place. He would make it stop, he would do anything—_everything_—to make it stop, if she would just tell him what _it_ was.

Elizabeth mumbled something, her voice blurred completely by tears, words unintelligible. He caught a word or two, unconnected thoughts, remembering the past or the dream, no doubt, from the feel of it. He didn't ask her to elaborate. Instinct, perhaps, or inability to open his mouth and say something that wouldn't sound utterly wrong, or maybe because he knew, if she was anything like him, she would despise a reminder of her weakness.

But she was going to talk. He resolved that, he was determined, they had all night, and she was not leaving this room until she gave him some explanation, something to go on, an _inkling_ even, of the dark shadow in her. The key to the shell she'd become. Apart from his selfish curiosity to know what could have gone so horribly wrong in her privileged life, he didn't want to see her hurt. The closer he was to this constant, hardened pain of hers, the more he hated to see her suffer. She was suffering. She confirmed that now, willingly or not, as she—for lack of better description—fell apart in his arms.

Delicately, Jack shifted away from her. He lifted his arm from around her waist and rested it on her shoulder, curving it behind her neck to keep her still, still half-expecting a bolt for the door or a vicious verbal assault. His hand was still against her cheek, but her head was dipped, her hair in tangles around her face, she was still crying uncontrollably, yet now she was quickly realizing her position and trying to compose herself.

"Elizabeth," he said quietly, in a calm, least-threatening tone he possessed, making his voice easy and soft. "Honey." The endearment, even quieter, caused a raised eyebrow from him; he was a bit floored by that one. He could only guess a moniker so uncharacteristically _sweet_ must have been inspired by the distracting color of her silky hair. She tried to take a deep breath, but she was prevented by another rush of tears mid-intake, and tried to bring up her arm to block her face. Jack firmly knocked it out of the way and nudged her face up. He ran his thumb under her eyes, streaking her already smudged make-up across her face. Her red-rimmed copper eyes looked defeated, disgusted, misty with so many things. Her eyelashes, wet and heavy, blinked slowly, trying to hide her eyes. He pushed her hair back, dragging his fingers through it, avoiding the knots while he framed it back around her face. "Hush now." He commanded softly, not in any way suggesting that he was annoyed by her weeping.

Jack removed his arm from around her neck gingerly and slid his hand off her cheek, getting off the bed with his eyes still fixed on her face. She lifted her chin at his movement and looked towards the head of the bed, still refusing to look at him. She was still getting herself in hand, still trying to stop the tears and the trembling and he knew she was already trying to harden herself again, and subsequently failing. He turned to the corner and jerked an old box forward, opening the top and reaching into the jumbled contents within. A surprisingly cool bottle and a glass reappeared with him. He thumbed the cork out deftly, turning back to Elizabeth with a stony face. She reacted slowly, reaching out tentatively and then looking up with a slightly quizzical look to her deadened eyes.

"Wine," Jack stated grimly, pouring the blood red liquid into her glass. He didn't miss the shake of her hand as he handed the cup to her and she grasped it tightly. He set the bottle on a table next to the bed, keeping his eyes on her. She seemed desperate for the distraction of a drink, and tipped the glass to her lips. Her nose twitched slightly as she drank, and her lips trembled when she brought the glass down. "Bitter. It drowns what makes your skin crawl." Jack offered by means of explanation of the sharp alcohol.

He stepped up closer and stood in front of her, where she sat with her glass at chest level, one leg off the bed and the other angled in towards her stomach, where Jack had slid it off his lap. He reached out quickly, before she could avert her hollow eyes, and held her head again, not her cheek but behind her ear, gripping her hair and running it all through his fingers smoothly. He let himself weigh her tolerance first, staring unflinchingly at her in a way he knew she would hate.

"You are going to talk." He chose his words carefully, speaking slowly in a way that wouldn't easily be challenged, and not relaxing his grip on her. He thought there was a change in her eyes, subtle, but a slight pull back to a point.

"You'll never get me that drunk," she said hoarsely, her nail tapping against the glass. He reached up with his other hand and rested it on her other cheek, holding her face between his palms now and watching her steadily.

"Being drunk wouldn't fix a damn thing," he said, a slight edge to his voice. "Take it from someone who knows." He ran his thumb across her lip, for a moment not realizing the sensual side of the touch and only trying to soothe. Tears, tears again that welled up and she did a commendable job of not letting fall. "It's eating you up, Lizzie, killing you. You can't do this do yourself. You can't let whatever _it_ is stay in your mind."

She swallowed hard and her hand came up to grip his arm, squeezing above his elbow tightly.

"Shouldn't I take advice like that," she asked in a defeated, last-attempt voice, "from_ someone_ _who knows_?"

The truth of that hit home. He didn't flinch, didn't react. He looked at her again, studying, searching. The right choice of words, and she was moments away from making the decision not to let this crush her, to tell her story—but the same accusation in her response was what stopped him from stepping that line. Again, he picked through the minefield of dangerous words gingerly.

"Peas in a pod, love," he said softly, running more hair through his fingers, "but I don't cut myself open."

She pulled on his arm, until he was closer, and tilted her head up to look at him, closer.

"I need more wine, then."

It sounded like she was heralding her own doom.

* * *

--Our Lady of Sorrows: by My Chemical Romance

**REVIEW. pretty please. **


	8. Death of Cinderella

**A/N: **I'm afraid I owe a COLOSSAL apology for the long weight. School work was heavier than anticiapted MUCH earlier than anticipated, and sadly, I also must own to the sudden bought of writers block I enountered whenever I got the chance to sit down to the laptop. But, hopefully, with the help of my super beta** royalpinkdogs,** I've managed to make up for it.

You should let me know in the form of a review ;)

Enjoy!

* * *

**Chapter 8: Death of Cinderella**

She was sitting on the bed, the clear glass of watery ruby wine in her hand, her head leaning against the headboard of the bed, looking off at the wall, away from him. He was in his chair across the room, feet propped up on the table, turned towards her, giving her space. He was waiting for her to start.

She turned her head, looking at the still liquid in her glass, before letting her head shift to focus on him. Her voice was soft and measured in the silence as she spoke.

"Do you want to question me? Or shall I just tell it like a bedtime story?" she asked, the sarcasm gone from her voice. It was gone like the fire had been blown out. He couldn't help but stare at her in the soft light of the cabin, almost entranced by the haunting beauty of her. Her make-up was smeared from the crying, and her thick curls strewn around her in a chaotic tangle, but she was so striking, sitting there, her eyes so piercing. He could look at her and see things he'd looked for all his life. Peace, beauty, laughter. He saw it when he looked at her, even though those qualities were faded and faraway in her.

He let his hand drop onto the table next to him and pressed his hand down, splaying his fingers over the rough woodwork. He didn't directly answer her question; he surveyed her in silence for a moment.

"Why do you react the way you do to William's name?" he asked instead. She tapped her smallest nail against the glass, looking at him solidly. She raised it to her lips and took a drink, staring ahead when she answered.

"Because I hate him." She answered dully, in a measured voice, as if it were the simplest thing in the world. He raised his eyebrows, admittedly floored at that declaration. He had expecting something more…non-vicious, perhaps?

"Hate?" he repeated softly, tilting his head at her. She kept staring across the cabin at the opposite wall, like she had no idea of his presence in the room; looking hypnotized by something he wasn't privy to seeing.

"No," she said suddenly, her lips barely moving. She turned her head to look at him again, her face pale, and the glass gripped tightly in her hand. "I _want_ to hate him." She said hoarsely, her dark, unsmiling eyes glistening again, though no more tears fell. "I want to hate him more than I want my own _life_ and I can't hate him. I can't _hate_ the bastard."

Her voice was shaking, her knuckles were white. Jack rested his hand over one of his knees and adjusted his posture so he seemed to be closer to her, though he was across the room. He let his eyes drink her in, every detail of the emotions he could read from her body and expression, and he tried to fathom this…unforeseeable confession. He could understand this.

"Elizabeth," he started sadly, resisting the urge to shake his head, not sure what reaction he'd get if he showed pity, "what _happened_?"

He asked it for what must have been the hundredth time since he'd stumbled across her in Tortuga, but this time he asked already having received her promise to answer his probing. He caught a flash of irritation in her glittering orbs and she slanted her piercing eyes at him.

"Once upon a time," she started cynically, grimacing at him, "there lived a governor's daughter and a poor blacksmith."

"That's not very attractive, you know, miss." Jack interrupted sharply, considering the tactics available in his situation. "Somebody might just slap your pretty face."

"Oh, you've been talking to my dear William then? Getting ideas from him, have you?" she snapped back instantly, raising one eyebrow in a furious way. Jack faltered for a moment in his sardonic chiding and clenched his teeth, catching a meaning in her words he didn't want to acknowledge, and not all that sure she'd meant it as he took it or just as another of her meant-to-shock comments.

"Why don't you hit me, Jack? Goodness knows I've done enough to provoke it." She challenged, raising the glass nonchalantly to her lips again.

Jack grunted, flexing the muscles in his hand and digging his nails into his knee, still picking apart her reply in his head. He breathed in deeply through his nose and ignored her jeering, determined not to let her steer him away from his goal as she pulled herself back together.

"This girl and her blacksmith. Perhaps the wicked father kept them apart? Locked her in a tower, if we're speaking in storybook terms?" Jack asked lightly. His wine glass was sitting full and neglected on the table, a surprising feat for someone like him.

"No, no," she answered, mimicking his airy tone accompanied with a touch of sarcasm, hardly a surprise. "The happy couple got married. In white and silk and sunny, happy thoughts. And then the blacksmith went and fucked it all up."

This whole game was making him sick. She was destroyed. There were no other words, and now, so close to the unveiling of the reason for her fall from grace, he shrunk back, not sure he wanted to know. Every thought he'd had had ultimately centered on the conclusion that Will had died, and she had run into a roadblock of decimating events after that. And now, from the way she spoke of it here, he sensed something darker.

"He fucked it up beautifully," she muttered, almost to herself it was so quiet. She elevated the volume of her voice one decibel, and threw him off guard with her next question. "Have you _ever_ been in love, Jack?" she asked softly, a strange new vulnerability in her voice.

He had a strong inclination to get up and leave her right then, to never question her psychotic motives again as long as she never, ever asked him something that intimate. That was too close for personal comfort, it was too revealing, too probing and he was in no way about to go there with her, or anyone—or himself, for that matter. With all the self control he possessed he remained stony-faced and seated in his chair, and though his instincts wanted him out of what could possibly now become too emotionally invasive, his mind anchored him to the room and refused to let him bolt, though he was on guard and a bit suspicious towards her now. _This_ wasn't the way anything was supposed to go.

"I don't believe this story's about me," he responded stiffly, his fingers splaying out on the table and brushing the base of the cool wine glass. He almost missed her movement; she was so quick; she stood up, her glass shattering on the floor, dropped from shaky, unsteady hands, the spilled liquid seeping across the floorboards like blood.

"That's _precisely_ the point," she hissed, not anger but desperation in her voice. It seemed he'd snapped her final strings; she seemed more a mix of too many suppressed emotions to be just angry with him now. "It didn't involve _you_, it never did and it _still_ doesn't. I knew you for a whirlwind of a moment and then you were gone and I'll be damned if you ever gave another thought to little _Elizabeth_ _Swann, _that troublesome spoiled bitch who caused all the trouble in the first place and fancied herself in love with that fumbling _boy_. You hardly had any sort of attachment to me beyond a sordid night on an island most of which you spent sloshed out of your bloody mind—and five years later you stumble across me in a tavern in your beloved haunt of debauchery and you _what_? You act as if the world has turned upside down because I'm no longer some prissy debutante with silly dreams in her head? You carry me off on your ship and you _stare_, oh you always _stare_ at me, as if I'm some sort of scientific impossibility. You want this—this story out of me, you want to know the whole devastating affair, and you ask _what_ _happened_, and you look at me like I've let _you_ down and I don't _understand_ it!"

Her volume had risen slightly, she glared at him with turmoil in her eyes and her shoulders shook, her fists balled at her sides. Her pause was a split-second.

"What do _you_ care if I gouge my veins open to watch the blood run? What is it to _you_ if everything I loved and believed in was dissolved before my eyes and ripped out from underneath me, when did it become _your_ concern that Will was never who I thought he was, that he left me heart-broken in the rain and the mud, how will that ever, _ever_ hurt you like it's destroyed me? Where do _you_ belong in my fucked up, ruined fairytale—what do you want from _ME_?"

He wasn't concerned with her screaming waking the entire crew—or rather, the entire Caribbean; He was torn between triumph at the final release of her torment and the impact of her words. Elizabeth looked away from him violently, throwing her head to the side, and moving forward; Jack, thinking she was going to run for the door, stepped in front of her and caught her in his arms, trapping her. She didn't move, she stood in the circle of his trapping arms and stared at any point away from him, her throat moving as she swallowed and her lips trembling as she took in her breath.

"You want to know _what_ _happened_?" she asked sharply, still gazing off at the wall beyond his arms. She turned to him violently, her eyes blazing darkly and furiously, her moods flipping too fast for him to keep up with. "I lost three babies. And he _blamed_ me for every one of them. I had said _horrible_ things to my father and cut him out of my life to marry Will and then he treated me in the _same_ chastising manner as dear old dad, he fastened the same constraints on me and informed me when my behavior was _inappropriate_. He acted as if I somehow made him feel like he wasn't _providing_ for me like he should, he was _bitter_, and jealous, we fought all the time and when I—when I—" her color drained from her face and she choked over her words before going on. "When I lost the first, we were okay then, we were still _happy_, and I hadn't wanted children but that all changed when I got pregnant, and then I lost it and he _blamed_ me, he thought I _caused_ it, on purpose…he said such horrible, _awful_ things, and all I could think about was that child and wonder if I had done something _wrong_—and even after he apologized, I could see it in his eyes, and after the other two, those devastating moments filled with blood and sorrow and agony, he looked at me like I had let him down, he told me I was careless and it didn't _affect_ me."

Jack took her arms in his and gripped her tightly, trying to steady her, or to wake her up, to calm her down, for her hysteria was hitting him in the gut and reaching a frightening level.

"He started working so late, he never came home, and he was always so angry—he asked me if I ever regretted marrying him and it drove me insane, he would yell and blow things out of proportion, everything I said was to him a _slight_, when all I cared about was him coming home and putting his arms around me and he couldn't even do _that—_I can't explain, I can't tell you…everything fell apart so quickly, it was like we didn't know each other, and the more he realized I wasn't the girl he wanted the more I held on and couldn't let go, and when my father died he—he said it was for the better, that I'd stop thinking about what I'd given up and focus on him now and I slapped him and locked him out for days, I made him stay at the forge, and one night, I was so sorry and so hurt and upset and I went down to find him and he…_he was fucking some other woman._ And I heard him talking about me, to _her_, calling me useless and selfish and so many things."

Jack pulled her closer, his teeth clenched tightly, disbelieving, but she pulled back, struggling, unable to get out of his grip. She struggled and twisted, stopping finally with her shoulders shaking roughly and tears sliding down her cheeks again.

"I wanted to kill him! He came home that night, and it was storming, and he smelled like her, he smelled so sickly sweet and dusty and I confronted him with everything, I screamed at him and fought him—he couldn't deny a thing and he did, he tried to deny it all, and the look on his face when I repeated his words to him was all I needed, he didn't even _flinch—_he said—the things he said, and I was screaming so loudly, trying to fix it, _always_ trying to _fix_ it, he accused me of sleeping around, of deliberately killing those babies…I pushed him and ran out into the storm and he followed me, angrier than I'd ever seen him—it happened like a _nightmare,_ we were screaming and yelling, and I was trying to get away, to pull him back, and he turned and struck me or—or…and he was gone, and I was on the ground in the mud, and he was gone, he lef—he left me, _he left me._!"

She screamed, leaping back and jerking at his grip on her arm. He pulled her back towards him and drew her close, locking his arms around her and holding her against her will even as she twisted in his arms, again sobbing like she had when he'd awoken her from that nightmare; the nightmare he could only now guess was a rehash of the events.

"I hate him, I _HATE_ _HIM_! I hate him, I hate him, and he won't stay out of my mind and every day I want to know what I did wrong and why I couldn't make him happy and I want to know why the hell I still love the _fucking_ _bastard_!" she screamed, her voice muffled against the fabric of his coat.

Jack held onto her tightly, every reeling emotion in her body almost tangible in the tightened muscles of his arms. His teeth were clenched tightly, so that they hurt his jaw, as he comprehended every stinging word coming out of her mouth, getting lividly angrier with every revelation. His hands twitched to get a hold of Will, someone he'd once considered much of a fool but no less of a friend, his old comrade's son, and the perpetuator of her sorrow. To know, to hear that he'd struck her, that he'd gone for comfort somewhere else when he'd had her sitting in his home, simply wanting his regard, made Jack murderous, caused his blood to boil.

He pulled her with him over to the bed and sat down, leaving her still standing, his arms circled around her waist, one hand clenched tightly in her mess of amber curls, the other securing her to him between his legs and against his chest. He murmured her name in her ear, sliding his hand over her shoulder and back.

"You _don't_ love him, Elizabeth." He said, staring over her shoulder to the table across the room, where his wineglass still sat untouched and the mess of maps and charts lay, peaceful and unstirred. "You love what you _thought_ you had with him."

"_You_ don't understand." She moaned, shaking her head against his shoulder. She lifted her head and looked at him, eyes red and flooded, her make-up all but gone now, and her color as pale as white silk. He put his hand on her cheek and tightened the grip, tangling his fingers in the strands of hair falling over her ear and the side of her face.

"Yes I _do_." He said sharply, reprimanding her. She shook her head and looked to the ceiling, her emotion no longer hidden from him, it all showed in her eyes and she was all heartbreak and despair and she painted the most despairing picture in the world; all he wanted to do was take the pain and bear it on his own shoulders—he'd done this before, he'd taken injury like this before, all he needed was a glass and a drink, and she, she couldn't take it and she shouldn't have to, never _her_, she should have never suffered this sort of disillusionment.

"I loved him, Jack." She said despondently, "I _loved_ him. He was my _everything_."

Anger, again, and homicidal tendencies flared in Jack's conscious and his eyes hardened, he saw the set muscle of his jaw reflected in her glittering eyes.

"I know," he said softly, his fingers soft in her hair. His nerves were hyper-sensitive and on edge, and every sense seemed to be alerted to their surroundings.

"You came in that room," she said thickly, her voice shaky and hoarse from screaming, "and it was like everything came back so clearly, everything before…you made me think of when things were good…and then, you…" she took in a deep breath and looked up, blinking her eyes furiously. "You looked at me the way you did…I _hated_ it." She said almost inaudibly.

Jack looked at her solemnly and slowly pulled her close again, holding his hand against her neck and pressing her head into his shoulder. She pressed the base of her palm against his shoulder and wrapped her hand around his bicep, squeezing. Jack closed his eyes tightly again and bit down on the inside of his lip, tasting blood there. Elizabeth's nails pierced his skin through his coat.

"I want to sleep but I can't close my eyes." She said, her lips against his neck, below his ear. "I hear his voice in my head, and I see those men and feel their hands on my skin." She was whispering. He lacing his fingers in her hair again and tugged gently, pulling her head up to look at her. He didn't really hesitate before he pulled her head towards him and pressed his lips gently against hers, closing his eyes for the first time as far back as he could remember to a woman's kiss.

She responded in what he could almost pinpoint as some kind of relief; she slipped her hand under his coat and around his back, her other resting gently on his neck. She stopped for a moment and pressed her forehead against his, still crying, just a little, though her tears didn't bother him like female tears usually did. He took her lips under his again and reached for the tie at the neck of her chemise, something she'd taken to wearing around the cabin when she was alone, a simple, light garment. He pulled gently at the strings and unlaced the bodice so the sides loosened and the ribbon unlaced, and put his hands underneath the linen against her skin, sliding the fabric off her arms and letting it fall to the floor. She put her hands on either side of his neck and lifted her shoulders, he took her by the arm and pulled her onto the bed with him, laying out next to her and leaning over, his one arm across her stomach and under her back.

He opened his lips against hers and let his hand drift from her hair to her cool skin, his hands tracing the contour of her collarbone and shoulder. He wanted her near him, he wanted her to touch him, to look at him with her finally softened eyes and remind him of what was good and innocent in the world, or at least, what used to be. He thought of the compass.

Elizabeth arched her back to him and wrapped her arm around his waist, flattening her palm against his back and pulling him closer, her lips resting at the corner of his mouth, her eyes closed and her mouth parted. She let her head fall back and wrapped her leg around his waist; he put his hand behind her head and raised her mouth to his again, his kiss soft again, his body tangled in hers. She pressed her heel into the small of his back and he pulled his lips away a fraction, sighing.

"Jack," she said quietly, her voice husky, her breath against his ear, her back arching against him again. He slid his hand from her hair to the small of her back and held her tightly, kissing her again, his tongue against hers and his hair brushing against her shoulders. She gasped his name into his lips, tilting her head back more, digging her nails into his skin, unaccustomed to not only the immense display of gentleness from him, but the feeling of their bodies united in an age old embrace simultaneously comforting and satisfying.

He waited for her, waited for that touch of her nails on her skin and that clench of her muscles, before letting go himself and pulling her over the crest with him, keeping her wrapped in his arms when it was over and her legs tangled in his. He laid back on his back, his eyes closed, his chest rising and falling, and the sheen of sweat still covering his body. She curled against his side, her one small hand resting on his chest, just over the two rough gunshot wounds below which his heart beat steadily.

* * *

--"Death of Cinderella" Alanis Morissette

Alright, perhaps ten reviews at least this time? Come now, do comply. I see over 500 hits and close to maybe 10 reviews each cahpter. Do these figures sound disproportionate to you? Review, lovelies.


	9. Haunted

**A/N: **I'm sorry it's been a little while, school and all. That, and I wasn't sure quite what to do with this chapter for a while...thanks SO MUCH to **royalpinkdogs **my outstanding Beta; she really helped with this chapter!

Enjoyyyy

**Chapter Nine: Haunted**

_Elizabeth untied the white bonnet on her head and ran into the fresh-smelling cottage, her feet bare on the warm wooden floors. She laughed as he grabbed her from behind, swinging her around and planting a kiss on her lips before setting her down in front of him._

"_You know I was supposed to carry you over that threshold?"Elizabeth beamed at him and slipped her arms around his neck, looking up into his light chocolate eyes with sparkling eyes._

"_Since when do I do what's expected of me, my dear?" she asked, pressing her index finger against his lips. She turned around and clasped her hands in front of her chest, looking around the cozy room. "It's so lovely." She said._

"_Small, if you think of what you're used to." He answered a slight frown on his face. Elizabeth waved her arm breezily and walked to the door, shutting the world gently out. _

"_I'm used to big empty spaces and unfamiliar faces." She answered. He raised an eyebrow comically._

"_How poetic," he said, holding out his hand to her. She took it, and clasped it in both of her hands, smiling softly._

"_Don't think I'm going to miss any of that gaudy nonsense," she said, running her fingers over his knuckles. "How could I, when I've got you?"_

_--_

_Elizabeth put the brush on the table and tightened the strings on her nightgown, checking her hair once more before she walked to the bedroom door and opened it, peeking out hesitantly. He smiled at her from across the hall, where he leaned against the wall. She smiled back shyly and opened the door, allowing him entry. He shut it behind him gently._

"_You look beautiful," he complimented, pulling her close to him and giving her a chaste kiss on the lips. Elizabeth leaned into him and splayed her hands against his shoulders, trying to remember every whispered conversation she'd overheard from the maids about their lovers. Will put his hand in her hair and kissed her cheek. She squealed in surprise when he picked her up and carried her over to the bed, closing her eyes and biting her lip. He lay down next to her and kissed her again, she sighed, finally able to enjoy his kisses without feeling ashamed. His hand reached for the tie at her neck and she ignored it until he pulled it loose._

"_Will!" she gasped, pulling back. She bit her tongue, unsure of why she'd protested. He looked baffled, and pulled his hand back like he'd been burned._

"_Did I hurt you?" he asked, genuinely confused. _

"_No," Elizabeth said, rubbing her lips together. "What are you going to do?" she mumbled, looking at him uncertainly. He looked even more confused._

"_I'm going to—ah, Elizabeth?" he asked pleadingly, looking scared now. Elizabeth licked her lips, kicking herself mentally._

"_What I meant…never mind." She said, blushing and entwining her arms around his neck. She pulled his head down and kissed him again; he waited a moment before letting his hand fall back to her nightgown. He pushed it off her shoulders, and Elizabeth squeezed her eyes shut as he pulled it down, baring her body in a way she had never experienced before. His hand moved off her for a moment and he pulled back, looking down. Elizabeth bit her lip, embarrassed and shy, wanting to pull something over her._

"_Will, I'm _cold_." She said suddenly, clearing her throat. He looked back at her, his hand working the buttons of his breeches. He leaned down and put his head next to hers on the pillow, bringing his hand up to stroke her cheek._

"_You won't be." He said, as if she was supposed to know the meaning of that. He kissed her again, and pulled her under him, running his hands down to push her nightgown up _and_ his breeches off. Elizabeth gasped in surprise, opening her eyes, and Will touched his tongue to her lips. She giggled and he looked at her in surprise. She shrugged and blushed, not sure what to say, and still completely embarrassed. _

_Will moved his foot against hers and pushed against her leg; she let him move it where he wanted it, and he pushed himself up on one arm, his white shirt brushing against her exposed chest. Elizabeth resisted the urge to cover her eyes. She felt him press against her; tingles shot up her back and her breath caught in her throat. She reached out and pressed her palm against his chest._

"_Wait!" he looked at her, his eyebrows furrowed._

"_What is it, Elizabeth?" he sounded worried, but impatient._

"_Will this hurt?" Elizabeth asked, blushing again. Will seemed to falter and looked at her uncomprehending._

"_I don't know," he answered, shaking his head. Elizabeth tapped her fingers against his shoulder and bit her lip. She looked up at the ceiling and back at him._

"_Then…kiss me or something while you…do it." She said uncertainly, an uncertain smile playing on her lips. Will nodded, grinning suddenly. He bent down and kissed her, sliding one arm under her back. Elizabeth let herself sink into his kiss, and his hand massaging her back, the cold of his newly-placed wedding ring interesting on her skin. She flinched when she felt him against her again but she didn't stop him, afraid she was doing something wrong. She bent her head back, his hand touching a particularly sensitive spot on her small of her back and sending more tingles up her spine, when a sharp pain spread through her._

"_OOWW!" she squealed, pulling her lips away from Will, her eyes watering. She looked at him, her eyes questioning, and her put his hand in her hair, looking apologetic. Elizabeth bit her lip, and as he shifted on her she closed her eyes and whimpered, still hurting or something from what he was doing. He bent down and kissed her again, his hand gripping the back of her shoulder tightly. He moved his hips and moaned, squeezing her shoulder tightly. The hard, calloused skin of his hand scraped her shoulder and she jerked it away._

"_That hurts, you're holding too tight," she said tentatively. His hand slipped down her back; she winced again._

"_I'm sorry," he said, lifting his head up and looking at her, his eyes cloudy. "I love you, Elizabeth." He said tensely, touching her cheek. She smiled at him and let his fingers run down her spine, the pain fading and the feeling of his hands not altogether unpleasant. He pressed his lips to hers again and she felt him moving on her, not hurting her this time, his legs pushing against hers. She grasped onto his shoulders uncertainly. She broke the kiss._

"_Will, what do I do?" she asked, a little frustrated, breathless. His hair was wet in front; he looked at her again, his own breath coming in short gasps._

"_You're fine," he gasped, pressing his forehead against her shoulder, "don't—move." Elizabeth swallowed and complied, just holding onto his hair and pressing her lips against his shoulder. _

_He pressed hi face against her neck and she smiled, more receptive to that. He whispered her name in her ear, tickling her, and she giggled, moving her head. She curled her foot around his and curved it in towards her, and he groaned into her shoulder. Elizabeth gasped as he moved a hand up to her shoulder again and grasped hard, scraping her again, and she was about to protest when he shuddered and let go, his muscles relaxed, his body still. He rolled onto his side and let her lay back gently against the pillows and lay next to her, resting his head on her shoulder. Elizabeth pulled her arm over her breasts self-consciously, unaccustomed to them being exposed. She looked at him and blushed, turning and burying her face into his shoulder. He put his arm around her waist._

"_I'm sorry I hurt you." He said, kissing her forehead._

"_It wasn't that bad," she replied, snuggling closer. She closed her eyes listening to his breathing, and thought about the servants' conversations drowsily. She remembered some of their whispered stories and had an inkling that it wasn't supposed to go like this…_

_She fell asleep in his arms._

_--_

"_Will, bring the ribbon in my box. My hair's getting all in my face." Elizabeth called, pushing up her sleeves and drying off her hands with a towel, taking a break from the clothing in the wash basin and looking around. He knocked something over in the bedroom and appeared in the doorway, holding up a ripped and frayed maroon cloth._

"_This is filthy," he commented, giving her a quizzical look as he held the rough fabric out in front of him. Elizabeth started across the room to take it when he pulled it to his eyes and looked closer, raising an inquiring eyebrow. "It smells like_…_throw this one out, Lizzie, I'll get you a new one." He said, folding it up in his fist._

_Elizabeth shook her head and took his hand, unfolding the fingers gently and taking the ribbon out. She bit her lip between two teeth as she swept back her abundant hair and tied the ribbon in a bow to bind it back._

"_Don't call me that," she said mildly, hardly aware of what she was saying. She turned back to the wash basin. "Don't worry about buying a new one, it's only a ribbon." She added._

"_I think we can manage to afford a strip of cloth, Elizabeth. Besides, I like you to have pretty things."_

"_I don't need pretty things, darling." Elizabeth replied absently sticking her hands back in the basin. Will came up beside her and laid a hand on her arm lightly._

"_At least let me get you one, something…blue." He suggested, touching the string of her apron, which was a pale azure._

"_I _like_ this ribbon, Will." She said suddenly, touching the end of it as she saw his hand reach for it. She didn't want him to remove it. "Jack ripped it off his bandanna."_

_Will stopped his stroking of her arm and looked at her curiously, surprised._

"_This is Jack's ribbon?" he asked, sounding a little odd. Her hands stopped moving in the soap and she tilted her head at him._

"_He said he had to leave something so that I wouldn't forget who gave you the guts to…take the opportune moment?" she smiled and raised an eyebrow at her husband's weird expression. "I don't think he knew you were going to pull that rescue off."_

_Will touched the edge of the ribbon again._

"_Why would you want to remember him? He betrayed us, for the most part, and threatened your life."_

_Lightly, Elizabeth shook her head at him, and stood on tiptoes to give him a kiss._

"_Don't say that; he saved my life. He's our friend, Will." She said. Will shook his head, his eyebrows knitting together in the middle._

"_I don't generally call pirates my 'friend'." He said, his eyes going back to the frayed ribbon in her hair. "I thought you were over that fascination with pirates." He commented, sounding a little petty. She looked at him, confused._

"_Why are you reacting like this?" she asked, genuinely unaware. He frowned and didn't answer, his weight shifting from one foot to another._

"_You kept a ribbon…that a pirate gave you…it's like a token of being sweethearts or something." Elizabeth stared at him for a minute, and giggled. She turned back to the basin and glanced at him again through her eyelashes. Her smile faltered when she saw the expectant look on his face._

"_Is that what you're—wait, Will, this is ridiculous. You're jealous of _JackSparrow_? Goodness, it's only a bloody piece of cloth."_

"_Then throw it out."_

"_No." she frowned at him, and took her hands out of the basin, crossing them across her apron and ignoring the soap. "And may I ask if it would bother you if it were an old ribbon of James Norrington's that I wore in my hair?"_

_He didn't answer right away, he stepped forward and put his hand on the side of her head gently, his palm on her cheek._

"_I'm not accusing you of anything—"_

"_You sound like you are," she interrupted coolly. "It's just a ribbon. And Jack was a good man." She said with finality, turning back to the clothes. He sighed and kissed her on the top of the head habitually, still inexplicably irked by the ribbon._

_--_

"_That's wonderful, Will!" she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her lips against his neck, muscles exhausted from a day of scouring pots and pans, washing clothes and sweeping the floors, her knees bruised from the pressure she'd put on them plucking vegetables from the garden. "An entire company commission." She sighed, pressing her cheek against his. _

_He held her away at arm's length, smiling enthusiastically._

"_It's going to swamp me, I won't be home much for a week, but it's an incredible amount of money, and you don't turn down the commander" a pause and he added "we could think about starting a family now." _

_He squeezed her arms, and Elizabeth let her fingers play with the frayed edges of his coat. She tilted her head at him._

"_You're my family," she said, pursing her lips, "that's all the family I need."_

"_You can't be serious about not wanting children," Will replied disbelievingly, a skeptical look in his eyes, made more prominent by his raised brow. _

"_And why can't I?" Elizabeth asked primly, her eyebrows shooting up into her hair comically. _

"_You're a woman!"_

_She removed her hands from his swiftly, and let them fall to her hips, the smile gone from her tired face. Will realized his mistake and jumped in to cover it._

"_I mean…well, it's natural to want children. Living example of love."_

"_I do not have to have a baby to prove that I love you." Elizabeth said smartly, her eyes narrowing. "I thought I made it clear I didn't want one? Or two? Or _any_?"_

_Will looked at her in exasperation and didn't understand why she was so against it._

"_I never thought you were serious!"_

"_Start learning to take me seriously, Will!" she snapped, stomping her foot childishly. "I don't like children, I never have, they're noisy and messy and I don't want to share you with a snotty little brat!"_

"_You'd feel differently if it were your own, if it were ours."_

"_I don't want children!" Elizabeth said loudly, glaring at him. He stopped a moment, taken off guard by her force. He nodded his head. _

"_Calm down, Lizzie, I'm sorry, I just…I always saw myself as a father—"_

"_Don't call me that," she said on reflex, as she had the last few times the endearment had come out of his mouth. He felt a prickling of annoyance. "I'm sorry, Will, but I thought you understood that." She added, softer._

"_I _do_." He answered dejectedly, trying to patch it up. He obviously said the wrong thing. She sighed and rubbed her palm over her forehead._

"_By all means, don't let it inconvenience you."_

_--_

_She looped her arms through his, walking along the dock with him as he went to meet the captain of the ship who'd given him his biggest commission. She played with the strings of her bonnet as they walked, finally getting fed up with the strings and letting it fall back and release her hair._

"_Ah, my good Mr. Turner!" a gruff, firm voice rang out and Elizabeth squinted against the sun as she looked around for the source; a burly, very stiff looking man was coming towards them. _

"_Captain Wentworth, may I introduce my wife, Elizabeth." Will answered formally. Elizabeth beamed; the captain tipped his hat to her and nodded shortly._

"_You've done an exemplary job with my men's swords, son, and I'll thank ye for that. Worth every penny, though I'll not speak of man's business in front of the lady." Another courteous nod to Elizabeth, too which she was less receptive. "Excellent, excellent craftsmanship." The captain murmured, nodding as he stroked his beard._

"_Thank you, sir; I hope they'll make do until you're able to get English commission." Will answered humbly. Elizabeth smiled and looked up at him._

"_Oh, Will is too modest, Captain Wentworth; he's really one of the best blacksmiths around, and swords are his particular talent." She said proudly, giving him a swift kiss on the cheek. The Captain gave her a small smile and nodded._

"_Charming," he said, turning to Will. He held out his hand, which Will took and shook firmly, his face set. "A moment in private, Mr. Turner?" he asked. Will slipped his arm out of Elizabeth's grasp and followed the other man away, standing a bit off and talking in a low voice. Elizabeth, more than a little miffed, stood with her arms crossed, waiting. He returned to her, and she didn't put her arm back in his._

"_He talked to me like I was a troublesome child," she commented in an annoyed tone, pulling her bonnet off and swinging it in her hands._

"_He didn't like your behavior. It was a little…improper." Will replied. She stopped walking._

"WHAT_?" she asked sharply, clearly angry. Will turned when he found her not at his side and looked at her._

"_You shouldn't have kissed me like that, it was just forward; he didn't approve."_

"_I believe I stopped caring for the approval of men like him when I married you, Will Turner." She hissed, tightening her hand on the bonnet strings. She glared at him. "And since when do __ou take into account the opinion of others on my propriety?" she demanded. He looked frustrated._

"_I have to look professional, Elizabeth, and you kiss me in front of my employer, it's…ah, it just felt odd."_

"_You shouldn't care what he thinks! I didn't make you look any less capable!"_

"_Elizabeth, please, I'm just trying to keep up an appearance here, to be recommended. What image does it give if my wife shows intimacy on a public dock?"_

"_Forgive me for marring your appearance, my dear husband. Shall I go home and have the servants tighten my corset strings?" she fired back sarcastically, raising her voice. He came towards her, looking around at the few people who'd turned to stare, and took her by the arm gently._

"_Elizabeth-"_

"_I don't care if they're looking at us, don't you see? I married you to get away from those stupid conduct rules. I should be able to kiss my husband in public!"_

"_I was under the impression you married me because you loved me." Will said, an edge of sarcasm to his voice. Elizabeth pulled her arm out of his grip._

"_Of course I did!" she defended. _

"_You're overreacting, then. I'm not reprimanding you-"_

"_What do you call it?"_

"_I'm just asking you to save your kisses for times other than business meetings!"_

"_Then, William, do leave me at home next time."_

_--_

"_Will?" Elizabeth called his name breathlessly when she heard his boots scuff the floor outside the door. She appeared in the doorway just as he shut the door behind him, shaking rain out of his hair. He hung up his coat and looked at her questioningly. She stepped towards him hesitantly._

"_Will, I'm pregnant." She said, smiling a little at the corners of her mouth. He looked at her blankly for a moment, and then surprise and a smile spread over his face. He stepped over the threshold and swept her into a hug, getting her soaked with cold rainwater. She giggled._

"_I knew you'd be happy," she said into his shoulder._

"_But you—what about you? I mean, I thought..." he trailed off, looking worried. Elizabeth shrugged mildly._

"_Well there's not much to do about it…and I kind of thought about having someone here during the day when you're gone, and then seeing him or her run to you when you come home…it might not be so bad." She admitted sheepishly. He squeezed her close again._

_--_

"_I was thinking Will," she said, as she sat down across from him at the wooden table in the kitchen, leaning her chin in her hand. "about a name, for the baby."_

"_Don't you think we should find out if it's a boy or girl first?" Will asked, raising his eyebrows. She waved her hand._

"_Oh, then it will be all rushed. Plus I think I'll be tired and I don't trust you." She teased lightly, smiling. "I think Rebecca, after my mother, for a girl…and Will, if it's a boy we have to name it Jack." She said dreamily, her hand in her lap._

"_We are _not_ naming him Jack." Will said, turning up his nose. Elizabeth didn't see his look, and assumed he was joking. She laughed._

"_I think it fits-"_

"_Honestly, Elizabeth, why are you so intent on remembering Jack Sparrow?" Will interrupted in annoyance. She looked up at him in surprise, lifting her head off her palm._

"_Why does he upset you so much?" she asked exasperatedly. "You don't think he's a worthy namesake? He did sort of bring us together; he saved my life." Will shook his head disgustedly._

"_And almost got us both killed numerous times. He's a no-good pick pocket, and I won't have my son named after a pirate."_

"_Our son." Elizabeth corrected coldly. "Or have you forgotten that I do have some part in this?"_

"_You'll name him Jack and then be telling him glorified stories of pilfering and murder. I don't understand why you think Sparrow hung the moon."_

"_And I don't understand why you think he's such a devil! Everything he did helped us, Will, and you know it! If it wasn't for him I'd be dead!"_

"_I like a man with an honest living on his shoulders."_

"_And I like a man who's not afraid to do what he wants for himself!"_

_They stared at each other across the table, and Will groaned, leaning forward on the table._

"_Forget I said anything, he's obviously a touchy subject."_

_Elizabeth laughed derisively and stood up, sweeping her dinner things off the table._

"_Oh yes, I quite forgot, you don't like me thinking of Jack Sparrow because of my obvious preference of him to you." She said sarcastically, leaning against the sink. "In fact, you seem to be rather accusatory towards me when he's brought up. Do you have something you want to say to me?" she asked sharply. Will sighed and turned in his seat._

"_What happened on that island?" he asked tiredly. Elizabeth's eyes flared, and her jaw set._

"_Absolutely nothing! What's in your head, Will?" she demanded angrily, glaring daggers at him._

"'_It never would have worked between us', what was that about then?" Will asked, mimicking Jack's voice. _

"_It's JACK he's delusional! He—you know, I don't find it necessary to justify myself to you. If you honestly sit there and think that I—that we—I don't know what's wrong with you!" she stumbled over her words, throwing her hands up. _

"_I don't understand how you can admire a man like him so much." Will muttered._

"_He's a good man!" she cried. "Why are we even fighting about this? Jack Sparrow is irrelevant to our lives, he is only a memory, a friend, and every time I mention him you act as if you are personally threatened!"_

"_Forgive me if the idolatrous way you seem to think of him gives me reason to be suspicious of—"_

"_Jack Sparrow has never laid a hand on me, nor I him. And if it's what you need to hear to soothe your bizarre jealous preoccupation, then there it is."_

"_I'm not jealous of him!" Will snapped, standing up. Elizabeth turned away to the counter and looked out the window stubbornly._

"_First the ribbon and now this. You act so insecure whenever you hear me talk about Jack. Pardon me if I have a bit of respectful regard towards a man who saved me from death."_

"_It seems you've forgotten who got you away from Barbossa and the likes of his men." Will responded coldly. "All the while Sparrow was negotiating our demise."_

"_Oh, Will," sighed Elizabeth tiredly. "This is ridiculous."_

"_What's ridiculous is you keeping a torn, dirty slip of a pirate's bandanna in your jewelry box."_

_--_

Will.

Elizabeth bit down on her lip and squeezed her eyes together, tasting coppery blood in her mouth. She raised her arm, finding it somewhere under silky sheets, and covered her eyes, just in case she relaxed her muscles and accidentally opened them. She didn't want to see the world around her, not now. She didn't want to see anything, really and she hadn't for five years. She sighed quietly to herself.

He was all she ever dreamed about—before, during, and after the marriage. Nothing but him, even if it was a vision of just her, sitting alone in a room or standing in the rain and just letting the ice cold water penetrate her skin…it was always _because_ of him. It always had something to do with him and she couldn't stop it and she hated it but she loved it, _loved it _though it was nonsensical in its insanity_. _But these dreams…the constant roll of benign memories that had flowed through her subconscious all this night; these weren't the mind-numbing exaggerations or frightening metaphorical nightmares she was usually jolted out of, they were genuine _memories_. Bits and pieces of the little moments of her sordidly ended marriage, moments that weren't tremendously painful or even the climactic points of the utter disaster that haunted her, and still—still she didn't want to see, she didn't want to _remember_. She just wanted it to _end_.

Elizabeth knew Jack was still in bed with her. She felt her legs still tangled around his under the light sheets, his arm under her neck and his fingers in her hair, curled against her scalp. She slipped her hand down the side of her face, untangling the knots in the strands that fell down to the side, and opened her eyes with a quiet sigh. She wet her lips with her tongue, swallowing the last of the blood, and feeling inexplicably sick to her stomach. His face was turned into the arm that was stretched under her neck, his other arm under the sheets, fingers splayed in the space between them. She didn't want to move another inch because she didn't want to face _him_ either, she didn't want to face either one of them, the man in her mind or the man in her bed, and yet here both of them were, right in front of her. Figuratively and literally.

She hadn't gotten drunk, she hadn't gotten past the first glass of wine and it was this astonishing fact that baffled her as to why she'd fallen to utter pieces last night. Why had she let herself crack, get vulnerable, why had she told him what she'd told him? Wasn't that just confirmation of everything she'd been trying to deny all these abysmal years—that it had all really, actually _happened_? She'd done the one thing she'd sworn she would _never_ do again. She'd lost her footing, yielded ground, and given the opponent ammunition. She'd let Jack Sparrow pull the details of her failed marriage out of her head and told him everything she'd erased and blacked out…and there was no sane, earthly explanation why.

That was it. _Why_. She didn't know why she had told him anything because he wasn't _anything_ to her and she didn't mean anything to him. She had let _all_ of it loose on a man who'd used her as collateral to escape years ago, on someone she hadn't associated with for five years and who she could honestly say held no influence over her—and she regretted every fucking word out of her mouth.

She regretted leaving the blissful numbness of seedy Tortuga, she hated herself for letting the facade she'd worked so hard to build crack and slip apart in a split second in time, and she hated him for hearing it. She hated him for seeing her fall apart, for being the first person—and a man, all the worse—to see her cry since she'd dried her tears for good, and she hated him for being there when she woke up, and making it that much harder to hate him as she'd hated all men. Her muscles were tense with the hate and the stress and the confusion, and still she didn't understand, knowing quite clearly the untoward animosity she felt for him, why she was still laying in bed with him.

Elizabeth drew in a sharp breath when she felt his rough fingers on her cheek, his thumb at the corner of her lip. She swallowed and kept her eyes on the ceiling, angry that he'd caught her crying, surprised that she hadn't noticed it herself. She turned her head away from him and disentangled her leg from his under the sheets, incapable of knowing what to say to him; she didn't want to speak to him. He shifted beside her, rising up on his elbow, and leaned over, his ringed fingers brushing against the back of her neck as he pulled her hair off of it. He pressed his lips against the dip between her shoulder and neck; she closed her eyes and sat up slowly, drawing the white sheets around her, her hair falling over the shoulder that hid Jack from her. He rolled over on his back and put his arm behind her, resting his palm and splayed fingers on the small of her back.

"Why're you crying, love?" he asked, his voice languid and deep. She closed her eyes and licked her lips. Maybe it was his voice like velvet that drew it out of her…

"Believe me," she replied quietly, her tone distant and measured, "it was an unintentional action."

"Purpose or no, there is a reason all the same."

"Which," she said carefully, eyes quite the dryer now and spine a little more rigid, "_you_ are not entitled to know simply because you think it some sort of rare, amusing novelty." She could freeze him out, if not kick him out of his own bed.

"I don't think it _amusing _when others cry." He responded, his voice more aware of her mood now. He moved his hand and wrapped it around her arm above the elbow, pulling her around. She reluctantly turned, wary of fighting against him, and looked at him as he reclined, gazing at her with his dark, probing eyes, his head pillowed on his crooked arm. "Ridiculous, maybe, and almost always annoying, but not _amusing_. And not when there's good reason to be doing it."

She watched him for a second more, and pulled her arm out of his loose grasp, turning back to stare at the aged wood of the opposite cabin wall again. With every intention, her voice dripped with sarcasm when she spoke again.

"How _gallant_ of you, captain."

"No," she heard him mutter, swearing an oath under his breath. He moved quickly, the sheets pulling, and sat up, moving so that he was in front of her, blocking her view, his arm stretched across to her other arm and holding her in a vice-like grip, his dark eyes burning.

"You're going to _behave_ now, Miss Swann," he informed her in a low voice. "I believe we've disposed of the facade of scintillatingly harsh bravado."

She jerked back from him but he jerked forward at the same time, and she hissed with pain as his hand twisted a burn into her bare shoulder. He tilted his head and raised an eyebrow, as if asking an insolent child to mind the rules. She twisted her shoulder again, opening her mouth, her fierce eyes locked on his stubborn ones. Wanting nothing more than for him to leave, she reprimanded him.

"Now, Jack, don't you have better things to do than discipline me?" she asked patronizingly, flashing her eyebrows distractingly. "Captain your _ship_, for example?" she suggested innocently.

"I consider it a captainly duty to keep up the morale of those residing on my ship." He responded sharply, easily keeping up with her searing words. "Otherwise dreadfully unpleasant things happen, often to those who are involved in distracting the captain." He bent towards her, conspiratorially, his eyes hard. "_Mutiny_, for example."

"There's a very good chance they'll mutiny if you continue to lounge about fucking _me_."

Elizabeth fired back acidly, pulling her arm out of his grasp while he was caught up with her words and grabbing his wrist. She bared her wrist to him unwittingly and his eyes fell to the fading burn and scratches there; she caught on and dropped his wrist like dead weight on the bed.

In a fluke of confirmation to her reprimands, there sounded a loud shout and curse from deck and a bang on the wall of the cabin. Jack barely flinched. He looked at her like he would hit her, furious, before he turned and slapped his hand against the wood behind the bed, shouting a harsh word loudly. He didn't look at her again as he swiftly dressed; in a moment of unconnected thought she admired the way he effortlessly attired himself with all of his _effects_ in less than five minutes. His boots reverberated loudly across the wood, thumping, and he swept her chemise off the floor fluidly, handing it to her in a mocking show of gentility. His fingers played over the 

edge of the chair across the room where his coat was hung, and as he plucked it off the back and placed his hand around the handle of the cabin door, he turned hard, almost vicious eyes on her.

"Best put on something different," he suggested, "wouldn't want the crew to think you were some kind of _whore_."

Elizabeth picked up the wine glass on the side table and flung it against the door after him, relishing the sound of the shattering glass. She snaked her hands up to her hair, knotted her fingers in it, and pulled, biting her lip until the pain was so sharp it went numb.

Why those words from him cut so deep was an unfathomable annoyance.

* * *

--Haunted by Evanescence

REVIEW!! Press the little Purple button! (or is it blue?) 10 reviews, that's all I'm asking


	10. Gone Forever

**A/N: **Sorry it's been so long :( We had homecoming at school, and then exam week, so please do forgive, dears. This is a bit short, I believe, but I AM trying to keep you satisfied.

Enjoy

**Chapter Ten: Gone Forever**

The Caribbean sky was clear, immaculate blue without a cloud in sight, and the sun was blistering, beating down on the entire crew with unrivaled force. Jack pulled his tricorn hat down a little more over his forehead, shielding his eyes more from the blinding light of the days' shining star. He tapped idle fingers against the spokes of the helm, surveying the crew through lidded eyes, occasionally shifting his weight. The sea was calm, hardly a wave was to be seen, and the just-afternoon-day was utterly lazy. No repairs, no inventory, no orders. It was a completely unproductive day in the kingdom of Jack Sparrow.

This gave the captain ample time to brood over the maddening mood-swings of his tempestuous carry-on.

He surveyed the crew with a professional's hawk-eye, not missing a thing and all the while targeting his main focus on her. _She_ was oblivious to the people around her—Jack's men who at least tried to look bloody useful even though there was nothing to do. Elizabeth was perched on the edge of the ship, by the looks of it from this distance curling her hand around some rope trappings to keep her balance and prevent her from toppling into the pits of the dark sea. Her head was tilted up, towards the sun; she was _sans_ hat and clad in a white smock with a crimson corset tied over it. Ridiculous, maddening, frustratingly _enticing_ girl.

Fortunately, none of his men were paying attention to her at the moment. Unfortunately, he wasn't deaf, and he knew they were all acutely aware of her presence on the ship. For the precise reason that they were in the middle of the ocean, and Miss Swann happened to be the only female specimen aboard the ship. And the sailors were perfectly un-cursed and fleshly. Jack's fingers tightened around the spokes and he gritted his teeth together, both annoyed and incredibly touchy at the thoughts. He could not pick out the exact reason why she seemed to pull animosity out of him until he projected it towards everyone who came within a six inch radius of him when he was thinking of her, whether it was the other men thinking of her or her raising her tempting eyebrows across the deck at them. She had made it perfectly clear she wasn't above slumming with them to piss him off, and she was more than pissed off at him right now, he could only assume.

He didn't want her with the crew; he made that perfectly, crystal clear, and all he could do was watch to see if she heeded it. The nagging issue was why did he so fiercely forbid it? Of course, he vehemently maintained that she was on board as crew, and that she was to be treated as any other crew member, that she was neither his personal plaything nor was she to be theirs, and the rules that applied to them applied to her: no distractions, do your job. The problem here seemed to be that Elizabeth considered it her job to either cause harm to herself or tease the entire crew with the intent of enraging him.

It was, to no end, a brilliant ploy that had the irritating effect of actually _working_. It was ridiculous to Jack that the real reason he didn't want her near the crew was because he didn't want anyone else touching her, and definitely not under his watch. Especially given where he'd uncovered her in Tortuga. He could not shake the image of the woman she _used_ to be, and though he had not ever thought her as fragile or pristine as she assumed he did, he never considered her as lowly as she was now in reality. It pricked him the wrong way to think of other men pressing their lips against her smooth skin and pulling tight on the curls in her honey-colored hair, and this—god forbid he call it _jealousy_—was completely unacceptable, as jealousy and its closest friend spite shrunk the mind to a one-subject mechanism.

A better suggestion as to why he didn't want people touching her was because he thought of her simply as Will's. Perhaps he just didn't see it any other way. Having been through his fair share of sloppily-pulled off affairs, angry husbands, untimely deaths, and general unpleasant life experiences, he wasn't opposed to a good happy ending strewn in to pepper life a bit. For her to be like this, and to have Will so completely besmirched by her wicked retelling of the past, struck bullet holes in a canvas of serenity causing Jack to, maybe, Jack could consider himself _in denial_ and just leave it at that.

But _that_ wasn't even it.

He thought of William, and he thought of her, and he almost visibly cringed. For no other reason than he, at the beginning, at the first, at the point where it all began with her epic fall into the water and the dramatic staging of a kidnapping, he had seen what they had all been blind to. That she was smart, clever beyond their _imaginations, _a leader, a taker, powerful and passionate. She, who had never been trained to fight, had picked up and made use of the objects in that cave on Isla de Muerta, beat back skeletal pirates that were fantastical to the point of disbelief, and all but saved them all. For where would they be if she hadn't been the one to shuttle back and forth, alerting them to change of plans. She thought he looked at her as a prissy, spoiled, sophisticated governor's daughter who got them all into a mess five years ago but there had not been a moment when he had seen that. He had always seen fire where William had seen water. He had always seen steel where William had seen putty. William had treated her in that time like the damsel who needed saving, where Jack could see she was just as aware and mindful of her surroundings and capable in her situation as the commodore himself—maybe more so herself, because she knew how to wield her feminine charms even then. She had been one of the few people he'd happened upon in a life so crazy and a world so chaotically insane who said _I am a person. _

_This _was why he cared. _This_ was why he swept her away from Tortuga and _this_ was why he nettled her and harassed her until he cracked her. And now there was the initial split, the first working of the wedge into the cold stone, and all that remained was the chiseling and the sanding until he could rip away dull steel and reveal the iridescence underneath. He didn't care if she wore stockings under a French-style dress or breeches tucked into over-sized boots, he didn't want her to tie a bonnet on and sit primly with a cup of tea. He wanted _her_. She was Miss Swann, the governor's daughter, she was Elizabeth the blacksmith's wife, but who she _was_ really, behind that over-bred nonsense, was _Lizzie. _A girl who, he had noticed, had pulled a book off his bookshelf when she'd been held captive so many years ago—Machiavelli's _The Prince—_and bookmarked at some point in the middle, never finishing it. That had enthralled him. It had made him study her when she wasn't looking, and analyze the nail print she marked under lines in the book. It made him unreasonably keep the ribbon she'd slipped into the pages tied there where she'd left it, those years ago.

They had all been too oblivious to her. Jack had seen how her father and the commodore had treated her. With good cheer, my dear, but as a willful child who simply needed to be told what was wrong and what was right—when in reality, Elizabeth's eyes were always glinting with some other idea, some thought far off, a step ahead of everyone else.

And it was all _gone_ now. Evaporated, diminished, her eyes were ice, her skin cold, her head full of nothing but the next biting comment and numbing her body with chemicals. She was hidden behind striking, intense make-up that glorified her gentle prettiness into the dark beauty of a temptress. She was barely human anymore; she wanted to be numb but she wanted to be alive, and the frightening self-destructiveness in her was hypnotizing and awful.

Jack swallowed hard, through a tight jaw; his hands were clenched tightly on the spokes that his knuckles were paper-white.

…_you're some kind of whore…_

He had almost taken it back. Almost; but had instead stormed out of the cabin, furious with her and his own idiocy, and taken out his burst of temperament on the first few crew members he'd seen. He only remembered the unabashed, silent look in her eyes when she heard him say it, her unmoving glare fixed on him before he banged the door shut behind him.

He regretted the scathing words now.

Jack lifted his head to find her, dragging his gaze slowly over the lolling crew to give his search a purpose beyond just Elizabeth. She was still in the same place, her arm stretched up on the roping. She turned and locked her eyes straight on his. It was too far away from him to extract the emotion, if any, that she projected there, but the connection was electric.

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--"Gone Forever" Three Days Grace

Ok, review. Do it, you know you want to, you know you have to. Cookies, and rum? At least 10 :)


	11. Points of Authority

**A/N: **I am so, so sorry about the long wait before the update! I truly apologize...but hopefully the fact that its the day after Christmas, the pretty holiday season, will grant me some amnesty? Please? I hope this chapter is sufficient, and if its not, I think I'm back on track and the next chapters [I hope] will be better, and up sooner than this one. So anyway, Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Yay Kwanzaaa and Happy New Year to all! :)

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**Chapter Eleven: Points of Authority**

Elizabeth ignored the feeling of her leg tingling, falling sleep where it was curled beneath her on the edge of the Pearl. She lightly tapped her slippered other foot on the outside hull where it hung down, hovering above the clear ocean water. Her arm twisted in and out of the rigging next to her loosely, up to the point where her hand gripped it tightly to ensure she wouldn't tumble into the ocean. She ignored the wind whipping strands of hair wispily against her lips and kept his gaze resolutely, a hard, blazing, unsmiling gaze from both of them that crackled and sparked. After a moment of harsh glaring games, she turned her head away, looking into the dull afternoon sun and smiling devilishly to herself.

"Af'ernoon, Miss Swann,"

Her iron-clad grip on the rigging almost failed her, as she jumped at the sound of Joshamee Gibbs' voice and nearly pitched forward.

"Mighty dangerous place ta be sittin', ain' it?" he asked, leaning against the side next to her, chewing on a stiff piece of wood. Elizabeth relaxed the burning grip she'd suddenly affected to a secure but less painful one, and gave him a smart look through her eyelashes, shaking her hair back a little.

"Another fright like that and I might fall into the deep blue, Mr. Gibbs," she answered snappily, not in a disrespectful way. "We society ladies scare easily, sire. You might not sneak up on me next time,"

"Ah, I wasn't sneakin' up, Elizabeth," he responded with a grin, "Kicked a bucket on me way over, guess you were just too lost in yer thoughts."

Elizabeth didn't respond, instead turning her eyes back to the horizon and following a soaring bird until it was just a speck in the sky. She'd known the man since she was just a girl; she was at ease with him. He didn't threaten or glare. He just seemed to care. Out of character as it was, she found it endearing. That he still thought _caring_ mattered at all in this world.

Elizabeth looked back at him, pursing her lips. He was looking out to sea, a very frustrated, honest look on his wizened face. Elizabeth felt a little steel creep up under her skin. She flicked her eyes covertly over his head, searching. She found him at the helm still, hardly moved. But this time with the compass in his palm, and the usual sour look that accompanied viewing the compass on his face. Perhaps, in order to avoid the frustration, he ought to invest in a new compass, rich pirate that he was.

"I've been wonderin' what's in yer head, Miss 'Lizabeth." Gibbs said quietly, just as calmly and un-menacingly as possible.

Elizabeth pressed her lips in a tight line and stopped her foot-tapping against the side for a moment, bringing her eyes away from the captain. She looked at Gibbs for a moment, and then back at the sunny horizon.

"You don't want to hear my thoughts, Joshamee," she said quietly, in a voice that implied a few rather frightening things. She caught a small shrug of his shoulders out of her peripheral vision, and shifted her weight, to lean against the rope at her side. Her mood was light, but that didn't mean she wasn't on guard, and it didn't mean there was a promise of peace in her atmosphere.

After a moment, she took a little pity on the old man next to her. After all, he had obliged her by telling her all those gruesome stories and teaching her those songs after father had forbidden her to ask another thing about pirates. Without him, she would have died of veritable boredom on the crossing from England all those years ago.

"Did our tempestuous captain send you over to spy on me?" she asked with a smirk. He gave her a wry smile, and blinked guilty eyes, shaking his head.

"Not 'im, missy. Just me nosy old self," he started, a small chortle in his throat.

"Ahhh," Elizabeth breathed, as if she'd just figured out what he was looking around for. Truth be told she knew it very well, but she wasn't going to let on to that. "Well, in all respectfulness and politesse, Mr. Gibbs, I have to deny you access to the inner workings of my unstable mind."

She tapped her temple with her index finger and flashed a smirk again. His brows knit together, his eyes looking apologetic. Surprising enough to her, he bravely soldiered on with his quite innocent prodding.

"'M just curious to know what's put ye in such a bad way, Miss' Lizbeth. What's happened to ye?"

Elizabeth gave him a sharp look, twisting so that she leaned against a slope on the side of the ship, her hands still entwined in the ropes, but now one foot propped on the side and the other planted on the deck.

"Why," she began, "must you and everyone else on this godforsaken ship presume something has 'happened to me'. Is it not a possibility that I tired of my ridiculously stiff old way of living and simply threw in the gauntlet?" she questioned sharply, mulling it over.

Now it was Joshamee's turn to give the sharp look. Elizabeth wasn't sure she'd ever really appreciated the intuitive, very clever glint in his kindly, crinkly eyes, but it was obvious now. He was quite obviously no fool.

"I been on this earth a good long time now, Elizabeth. Long enough to know when somethin's gone wrong with a good girl."

Elizabeth dug her teeth firmly into her tongue to keep from lashing out, the balance in her precarious mood slipping and tipping her inner scales toward misdirected rage. A little voice laughed at her, teased about the seeming imbalance of humors afflicting her that prompted her to lash out at every glint of invasion in her carefully constructed fortress of personality. Another little voice gnashed angrily at Gibbs, and another soothed her with gentle words. She almost lost her grip on the rigging, hearing the voice telling her to calm down, almost leapt in fury upon Gibbs just to spite that voice because the sound of it was uncannily maddening and familiar and she didn't know how Jack Sparrow could have gotten in her head…

"You see what I mean then," Gibbs said, breaking in on her inner bloody battle, a patronizing look in his wise eyes. Elizabeth licked her lips slowly, straightening her shoulders back and relaxing tensed neck muscles.

"Much can happen in _five_ _years_, Mr. Gibbs." She replied, a little snarl to her voice. He shrugged jacketed shoulders and raised an eyebrow.

"A change for the better and I guess you'd still have that pretty smile on your face, eh?"

"What business is my smile of yours, old man?" Elizabeth hissed, regretting those words instantly. They didn't seem to faze Gibbs that much, but she still felt for him. She sensed in him a very eagerness to help her, no ulterior motives, just a concern. And knowing him as a man who cared for others, who was loyal, and had served her father well…she believed him to be sincere.

He seemed to be looking at something over her shoulders for a moment, ignoring whatever she was doing, and Elizabeth curled her fingers into a fist, feeling her nails dig into her palm. She closed her eyes and turned her head, opening them and turning back just as quickly; he was looking back at her again.

"You know Jack's compass isn't _broken_?" He said dully, almost cryptically, his eyes boring into hers. Elizabeth raised her eyebrows, completely taken off guard by this random (and utterly false) piece of information.

"It doesn't point north," she snorted, rolling her eyes. Gibbs shrugged, his hands in his pockets.

"What be _north_, anyhow, Miss Swann? We ain't tryin' to _find_ north."

He said this as if it was the simplest thing in the world, and she was taken aback again.

Elizabeth tilted her head at him, now just one eyebrow quirked high onto her forehead. Something in her alerted to this cryptic bit of code-wording. She didn't know what it was, but it caused her to imperceptibly lean forward, a question forming at pursed lips. He didn't let her ask a thing; he turned his back, stepping away, and barking orders at two idling men across the deck, and then another at Pintel—who dozed on a bucket nearby. After his display of authority, he turned back to Elizabeth, shrugging his shoulders again. She watched him hawkishly, lips still pursed and head still tilted observantly.

"If I were to…inquire of Jack about this compass, what reaction would I receive?" She asked, propping her arm up lazily on her risen knee. Gibbs tipped his hat to her, narrowing his own eyes and settling his brows back to a normal rest.

"You let me know," he said, strolling off looking purposeful. Elizabeth let half her mouth turn up in a smirk, her eyes hard and calculating, and turned her head to try and follow him with her eyes. Something obstructed her view, and she realized what must have spurred Gibbs to make himself sparse, and to shout his authoritative orders. To look _busy_. Speak of the devil; Jack himself was standing over her shoulder, looking a little less than friendly.

"Are you operating under the impression you're exempt from work, dearie?" he asked bitingly, dark eyes smoldering. Elizabeth swallowed down a shudder at the fire in his onyx orbs. His glare was so chilling and so heated all at once…damn him if he did it on purpose.

"Are you in need of my _services_, Captain?" she responded coolly, meaning every bit of what the implication suggested. She didn't really give him a moment to answer. "No? Then I'm, ah, _on_ _break_."

"Contrarily," Jack began, ignoring her comment except with a cutting look from his lidded and piercing eyes, "your aforementioned 'services'—though not the ones you seemed to be so eager to offer—are needed in the form of mending a sale that the bumbling Ragetti ripped. Over there."

Jack pointed patronizingly to where Bo'sun was yelling angrily at a frightened looking Ragetti, who was holding a sail and hanging his head, his shoulders hunched. Elizabeth hopped lightly down from her perch and leaned back against it, sliding her arms out and stretching.

"Are you suggesting that I do the sewing because I am a female?" she asked sweetly, batting her eyelashes at him. Jack took her arm firmly and began marching her forward; Elizabeth made a noise of outrage and jerked her arm away, drawing her nails against his skin harshly in the process. He spun and pushed her against the side of the ship, pinning her there with his body and slamming an arm down on either side of her, his eyes blazing.

"I have about lost my patience with _you_, Miss Swann. You will follow my orders like any other man aboard this ship and you will not continue to question my authority without facing the consequences. Do not deign to assume that I will not lay lashes to your back simply because your _fragile_ _feminity_ cannot handle it," here he paused, giving her a mocking and terrible smile, and she leapt in, jerking against one of his arms, pressing a palm to his chest and slamming him backwards. He stood strong enough to barely move, and laid his hand over hers, squeezing her fingers in a way that distracted her. Friend or foe, was he?

"You continue to test the waters, Lizzie," he growled softly, so many meanings behind his words and in his eyes that she was momentarily at a loss, trying to find them. Distracted, hypnotized, she wriggled her fingers, grasped his arm and pushed, slipping it from the side of the ship and unlocking the gate of his arms.

"How does your compass work, Jack?" she asked softly, menacingly, suddenly stuck overwhelmingly by Gibb's cryptic words and crushed in his eyes and by his aura. Jack's eyes flickered and he searched her face. He removed her hand from his chest, where she had felt his heart, and reached into his pocket, thrusting the compass at her roughly. She caught it against her chest, smirking slightly.

"That compass," he said dangerously, in a light voice, "is broken, my dear."

He took her arm and jerked her in front of him, taking her shoulder and leaning down close to her ear, pointing over her shoulder to Ragetti and Bo'sun, speaking patronizingly as if to a small unruly child.

"Now get to work."

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**A/N: **Thoughts? Review, please!


	12. Cherished Agony

**A/N: **Erm. It's unforigvable. I have no excuse, except to plead writer's block and real life and hope you'll accept. I really am sorry, for neglecting this story so long! Ah, but now, dear Muse has returned to me, and I've got a better handle on the course of the story. It's not going to be too much longer, but there are still a good few chapters to go. I've known the sort of way I was going to go for a few chapters now, I just lost the drive for a bit. So please! Do read!

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**Chapter Twelve: Cherished Agony**

Elizabeth forced open tired eyes, focusing on the dark side of Jack's cabin opposite the bed, then roving to the bedside table and jumble of junk on the floor next to it. Slowly, she relaxed her tense grip on the bedclothes that were tangled in her fingers and shifted her shoulders ever so slightly, pressing her lips together until the pressure of them against her teeth hurt. She continued to stare blankly into the dark, surprised she'd woken so peacefully—surprised she'd fallen asleep at all. For the first time in a long time, she struggled to recall memories of her nightmare; she floundered in sewing back the pieces of memory that haunted her sleep.

She shifted her head, her neck aching, and everything seemed to snap back into place in her mind; the flashes flooded her conscious and she closed her eyes against the overwhelming backlash of the dream she'd been foolish enough to think she'd forgotten.

"_You bastard, Will! Who was she? Who is she?"_

"_Elizabeth—"_

"_I hate you. I hate you more than I've ever hated anyone…I…everything, I gave up everything…I HATE you Will Turner, and I'll kill you for this—"_

"_Eliz-Lizzie, wait, please—"_

"_DO NOT CALL ME THAT!"_

Elizabeth sat up, drawing her knees to her chest and wiping her forehead, staring into the back of the cabin now, silencing her mind, adjusting to the dank light and hardening herself to the misery of the nightmare.

It was the one, the one where she ran and railed and screamed, and he screamed back with the same ferocity, and the storm crashed and banged outside, matching their equal fury and total heartache. The storm that had raged both inside and out and the great disaster it had precipitated.

And yet…this had been different. Yes. This time, while they raged at each other in the kitchen of their small cottage, while the shutters banged and they yelled their outrage into the thunder and winds, someone had been sitting calmly in a chair, in a corner behind Will, watching and smirking, a dusty and familiar bottle tipped in his hand. And this infuriating intruder of her dreams hadn't spoken a word until the pivotal moment when she'd slapped William, the instant before she'd bolted into the freezing rain. In that frozen second that seemed to last a millennia, when William stared at her in mute shock, rage, and hurt and she'd let loose a tidal wave of tears, the observer had raised his bottle to her with a satirical smirk, as if he knew her very soul, and spoken two words:

"_To freedom_,"

Words that rang bells in her head and sent her reeling back to a humid night on an island years ago. Before.

Scowling angrily into the blackness, hating him all over again, and loathing Jack all the more for mingling in her dreams, harassing her at night as well as during the day, Elizabeth reached up to her ear almost mechanically, grasping for an earring. She held back a shout of frustration when she remembered the gallant captain had taken her weapons of self-destruction, and she let her hand fall limply to the bed, holding her other arm in front of her and slowly sliding back the sleeve of her cotton chemise. She glared dully at the criss cross of ribbon like scars in the dark, hardly able to see them and yet oh so aware that they still showed, no matter how faint they had become now.

Elizabeth flexed her fingers, looking away from her arm to the right, where the door of the cabin was. She was alone. It was surprising; she had been in here alone for an hour before she'd somehow fallen asleep, after dinner, sitting at Jack's table, staring down his meticulously drawn maps and torturing herself with memoirs of her Tortuga days. Judging her every choice in life twice over. And she had been left alone. He had left her alone…why? He never left her alone.

And it irritated her now that she wondered why he had left her alone when she should be overjoyed that he'd finally backed off.

_To freedom._

Elizabeth visibly grimaced, hearing the words again. She slowly unfurled her legs and dropped lightly off the bed, bare feet hitting the slowly rocking wood floor. Her night clothing brushed the back of her knees, and she grasped for the strings on the front, pulling the laces until her chest was appropriately covered and the material showed only a slight swell of her breasts. She slipped over to the table and lit Jack's light, looking around when the room flooded in a dull, eerie light. His coat was thrown over the chair, his boots thrown against a wall nearby. She looked at them curiously, her hair falling over one shoulder, curling at the ends from where sweat had matted it. She turned again and tilted her head towards the door; nothing. No sounds coming from deck. It must be deep hours of the morning, the only time when there was maybe one person awake. A watchman. Elizabeth swept her eyes over the room one more time and started to move towards the door when something caught her eye and drew her back to the bed.

Compass.

She took it in her hands, weighing the mass in her palm, remembering holding it this same way as she lay on the bed a few hours ago. Glaring at it. Willing it to spill its secrets and cursing Gibbs' ominous postulations about it. She closed her hand around it as best as was possible and noted the cool top of it against her palm. She pulled her arm in close to her and turned, reached for the door, and left the cabin. She didn't bother to pull the door closed behind her.

The starry sky was brilliant, clear; the air was deceptively warm with a chilly wind that teased her hair and whispered hauntingly in her ear. Gooseflesh rose on her skin as her night gown danced around her knees but she ignored the chill just like she ignored every other physical discomfort that plagued her. Immediately, she glanced to the high deck, the wheel, and raised her eyebrows slightly when she didn't find Jack there. She scanned her eyes in a cursory way over the rest of the ship and concluded he must be below deck. No doubt drinking. All the better for her.

Elizabeth sidled up to the side of the ship where she'd reclined earlier in the day, leaning against the starboard side and casting her gaze out over the endless blue-black water of the sea. She propped her arms on the side and held the compass in her palms, running an index finger over the rounded lid of it before she flipped it open, focusing interestedly on the needle inside. The needle seemed to jump; it swiveled uncontrollably around its axis, occasionally pausing for seconds or twitching indecisively in one direction. Elizabeth's brow creased as she followed it with her eyes waiting—futilely, it seemed—for the thing to still. It refused. It simply fluttered around, unable to choose a point to stop. Intrigued, slightly mesmerized by the movement, and no less irritated than before about the whole ridiculous compass mystery, Elizabeth shook it slightly and, upon receiving no result, snapped it shut and tucked it into the front of her dress—where she somehow found fabric and a few tight strings to hold it.

Standing against the edge of the ship in this dead of night, Elizabeth again pulled back the sleeves of her chemise and revealed her scars, letting the wind touch them, uncharacteristically baring them to the world. She let the heavens see them, and she didn't care. She looked down, the scars more visible in this light, and remembered the blood that had seeped from them, remembered the gone-too-fast alleviation of the pain it had provided. It sickened her now and yet she longed for it. She took one finger and traced the puzzle of scars, letting her eyes droop, conjuring up her vicious dream again and locking her lips against any exclamations.

What was he doing there? Why was Jack making mockery of her misery in her nightmares?

"_You've made it clear you don't want me—"_

"_How, you bloody bastard? By having your meal on the table when you come home, later and later every night? By doing your dishes, your laundry?"_

"_No, Elizabeth, goddamnit! By every time you turn your face away when I put my arms around you, in every argument, in every look, in the way you withdraw—"_

"_Oh, I see. I'm the cold one, the heartless bitch, I've forced you to find solace in some pretty slut's arms—is that what you've been doing, banging away in your forge? Whispering to that harpy about how useless, how icy I am to you?"_

Elizabeth's hands snaked slowly up to her ears and she covered them subconsciously, the arguments passed fading to a dull buzz.

_To freedom._

She was coming dangerously close to unraveling everything. He, in her dreams. Both of them now, haunting, tormenting her. The dirty strip of bandanna. _Let's call him Jack._ The one lone bead Will had never found, that lay carelessly in the bottom corner of the jewelry box she'd left at their home. Wooden, painted red, and embossed with a Japanese character she could never decipher. Just a reminder. A secret. The compass felt heavy against her breast, suddenly, and her breath hitched slightly in her throat. She was acutely aware of the meaning of Jack's presence in her nightmare, and she again felt the sharp pain of it driven into her heart, the ice water that spilled out from that proverbial wound and threatened to consume her with guilt, anger, hate, everything. Looking up to the heavens with a strained expression on her face, her eyes dry and hurting, her mouth bent in turmoil, she pushed her vision as far as it would go over the dark waters, to the farthest horizon line, where she found what looked like a hint of daylight, a faint orange and pink, maybe yellow. Ah, the day. A time when the demons were at least courteous enough to sequester themselves away, to stop badgering her until night fell again. She looked back down to her wrists, the view sharpening, the angry red lines standing out accusingly to her.

She didn't react when the dark moved next to her, when a shadow—if that were possible—fell next to her. She was caught off guard, surprised, and yet grudgingly accepting to know he had found her again. She drew her bottom lip in, biting it hard and looked up, back out again, setting her jaw, her features. He didn't say a word, but she knew he was there, and she sensed he was oddly relaxed.

The silence couldn't have possibly been louder if someone had screamed their loudest into it.

"Any luck fixing me compass, love?" He spoke after a second, his voice deep and rich in the quiet. Elizabeth's teeth slipped against her lip and she tasted blood in her mouth. She flipped her wrists over and gripped the ship lightly, slanting her eyes to him ever so subtly.

"It's not broken, Jack," she replied slowly, a touch of tease and hardness in her voice, "it's gone mad." She finished, thinking of the wild spinning.

It suddenly struck her how appropriate and how chillingly close to herself the explanation was.

She almost felt Jack's sudden splitting smirk in the darkness. She heard the rustling of his dreadlocks and the quiet sounds of the trinkets in his hair brushing together as he shifted.

"It can be fixed yet, Elizabeth. Ye just have to know how," he stopped briefly; she heard him fiddling with something at his waist. "Ah, figure it for yourself, see." He said, in the same mystic sort of way Gibbs had initially used when speaking of the compass. Elizabeth's words slammed together in her head as she processed it. Tentatively, she inquired almost immediately:

"Then I'm to assume you know how?"

"I've a better idea, of late."

She turned her full attention to him after that, her eyes sweeping over his profile. He didn't react to her looking for a moment, and then turned his own face to her, his eyes just as mischievous and _him_ as always. She felt vulnerable, penetrated. Again, like he was staring into her soul.

"Where were you watching me from?" she asked sharply, narrowing her eyes at him. As un-threatened as she felt right now, it irked her to realize she'd left herself unguarded long enough to have someone sneak up on her. Jack grunted and turned around, resting his back against the ship and propping his elbows on it at a crooked angle.

"Crow's nest," he replied shortly, adopting the same manner of speech as she. It seemed he'd decided to play her game, ride her moods, and adapt to them. Could be a challenge. Or, she could just let it go.

She didn't. She wasn't about to throw in the gauntlet _yet_.

"And why, if I may ask, where you so covertly _spying_ on me in the night?"

Jack dipped his head down and came up smirking, the barest glint of a gold tooth showing up in the darkness.

"Well, Miss Swann, in order to avoid being accused of espionage in my own cabin when you inevitably awoke, I settled meself out here. Alas, you wandered out onto deck just as I'd gotten meself com'forble. Therefore, I think I may more appropriately ask: why were you so rudely sleeping in my cabin, or how dare you walk upon my ship at night when all respectable crew members are asleep?"

Elizabeth glared at him, and held her tongue. She faced back out over the water and tightened her shoulders, drawing herself up a little and crossing her arms over her chest, leaning to the side, tilting her head just a little. The pastel colored light so far beyond had started to spread just a little into the inky sky.

"Go sleep, Jack."

Elizabeth said quietly. She waited a moment to look at him again, but he wasn't looking at her anymore.

"Wha', and let you run amok about the ship, unsupervised? Unlikely." He responded, his eyes on something in the distance, towards the other direction. Elizabeth shrugged slightly and turned her head away, her hand reaching up to touch where the compass was inside her clothing. She felt the frustration, the fragility building, the dark thoughts of moments before flooding back, the need to lash out at him, shove him away, and the strange unfamiliar need to hear a rare soft word from him again.

"Are you going to stop this?" she asked in a low voice, blasting away any pretense of them being cordial. He raised an eyebrow in response, barely moving. She shifted a little so she was looking at him without really having to move her head that way, and took him in, her eyes hardening again. She noted his bare feet, his breeches buttoned at his knee, the wide open collar of his shirt that revealed a mosaic of intriguing tattoos. His face looked clean, and his eyes were a mirage of different things, deep chocolate surrounded by onyx black. She gave him a fiery glare.

"Stop, _what_, dearie?" he asked slowly, patronizingly, after a moment in the way one responds to a child when the child has just asked a rhetorical question, and waits impatiently for an answer.

"Watching me," she answered quietly, her voice brittle, she stepped a little closer, "_analyzing_ me," her eyes got darker, if possible, "attempting to _fix_ me."

Jack's eyes danced, a glint of something dangerous flaring deep in them, as if maybe hiding something more. Ah, so he had masks and walls to hide behind as well. Perhaps he took pleasure in the destruction of other's safe-holds?

"No," he answered petulantly, leaning close and smirking obnoxiously. Elizabeth stood her ground. She barely flinched. She was tired of, and at the same time used to, their game. He was still looking at her, still boring his eyes into hers, when he suddenly seemed to snap a little. He turned quickly and pinned her against the ship, spreading his arms out over hers, his legs even with hers, looking down on her solemnly and sharply, from his height. Elizabeth stoically remained cool.

"It's an impasse," he growled, jaw as set as hers, "I won't stop until you _stop_ and you won't stop until you kill yourself."

"Then let me _die_," she snapped back, like a snake backed into a corner, with nothing left to do but spit venom in the eye of its opponent. His smile was stressed, sarcastic, and bore hardly any light to it. He seemed strained now, even upset. She held back a remark on it, granting him his turn to speak.

"I don't think you want to die," he responded in a low snarl that had an underlying gentleness.

Their eyes battled for the briefest eternity; neither moved. It was as if a million things were spoken and nothing was heard. He dipped closer, one of his hands loosening on her arm, traveling up, gently touching. His fingertips brushed against her neck, the bare skin of her collarbone, ran over the place where the compass was kept. Her angry breath caught; he lifted curls off of her neck and replaced them with a light hand.

"I am not going to hurt you, Lizzie," he spoke firmly, and even a bit angrily, "I am not the _one_ who hurt you."

His lips grazed against hers before she could process and properly react; she wouldn't have been able to appropriately anyway. His lips were enticing, and she was trapped and no one was watching; Elizabeth wrapped the wrist he still had in his grip around his own and squeezed, drawing on his strength. Palpable understanding shifted in the air. The sky was lighter; the sun had begun its ascent quickly. She let herself feel that skin on skin contact in every place it seared the most, on her wrist, on her neck, and piercingly on her lips.

Years later, she glared at him, pale-faced, lips parted, her wrist still wrapped securely around his arm, her lips still stinging from the gratifying touch of his on them. He looked at her hard; she drew in her breath, it shook and she tried to hide it, he tightened a hand in her hair—how he had tangled his fingers in her tresses, she didn't remember. The blinding light of the sun burst over them and Elizabeth shrank back, protesting, pulling against him, tearing her eyes away and thrusting them out over the horizon, beyond his shoulder. Squinting, she found the holy grail of distractions and saviors. She moved her lips, couldn't find the sound of her voice.

"I've at least rendered you bloody speechless," he gloated, letting his smirk slowly ghost back over his face. Elizabeth dug a sharpened nail into the soft skin between his thumb and forefinger.

"Trouble," she managed, nodding her head over his shoulder. His brow came together for a moment; he turned, slipping his hand out of her hair, and made an angry noise in the back of his throat when he saw ship, sails billowing, poised for attack.

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'Cherished Agony'---Android Lust

**Author's 'request': **:] Please, leave a review. I really want to know what you think. I strive to answer all reviews personally, and I really love seeing the reactions. Virtual Rum!


	13. Sing for Absolution

**A/N: Faster this time, I did make good on my promise! Relatively...and providing reviews keep up, the next chapter is pretty much written and could be up in the next couple of days. So! Let's lead on:) Thanks [as ALWAYS] to royalpinkdogs; I'm sure beta-ing my stories is no easy task.**

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**Chapter Thirteen: Sing for Absolution**

Elizabeth stood still in her place for a moment as Jack bellowed loudly across deck. Someone she hadn't seen earlier stepped out of the lightening shadows from the high deck, shouting something in response. Jack began yelling, reprimanding the man for not spotting the ship Elizabeth had so nonchalantly just pointed out. He threw a quick look back at her before striding off, his jaw clenched tightly, and disappearing below deck, his shouts echoing:

"Oy, you scabrous-dogs, up! UP, I say, we've got a battle to win!"

At the word 'battle', Elizabeth's eyebrows drew together and she shook herself out of whatever reverie their nighttime moments had woven. She ran across deck to port side, where the offending ship seemed closer now, and squinting her eyes, examined the flag that had slowly been hoisted as Jack leapt into action. She gathered red and yellow, and immediately concluded Spanish, but on closer look, she found not the usual royal seal between the pillars on the flag but instead a blackened jester's cap that smoked angrily. She turned away from the odd image and found the _Pearl_ alive with activity—shouting, thuds, all sorts of actions that spoke of an impending fight.

She glanced down at her apparel and blinked, turning for Jack's cabin. She didn't bother to shut the door behind her as she went in; threw up the top of her trunk she kept and drew out a pair of rough breeches, slipping them on under her chemise. She tucked the bottom of the dress into the breeches and slid on a green vest, lacing it up tightly, pulling her beloved scuffed pistol from a compartment in the trunk only she knew about. She jammed it into her waistline along with a short knife and stood up, glancing around for a sword of some sort to complete her attire.

She snatched a ribbon from Jack's table, tying her hair back into a long bunch that fell down her back, reaching down then to tighten laces on the boots she eased into. She exited the cabin, eyes alert, and her blood reacting to the excitement. Jack's standard flew to the top of the mast.

"Cannons, OY, RAGETTI, what are you—"

"'EY, SHUT-IT!"

"Cap'n, tactical approach?"

"Wait for _them_ to come to _US_!"

Elizabeth lifted her eyes to the direction of Jack's voice, pricking her ears up and tilting her head. His order seemed strange, to wait, when the precautions and preparations that were swirling around her made it seem like he was anticipating a bloody battle. Why would they pause and wait for the slaughter, why not attack and have it on their own terms? She came forward, to the bottom of the stairs, and he was coming down, meeting her there. His eyes flew over her and something hardened in his gaze, taking her by the elbow he marched her toward the cabin, going in and slamming the door behind them.

His first act was to get his boots on in record timing, and next his coat and weapon-filled belt. As he tied on his sword and scabbard, he stepped closer to her and lifted his finger to level with her nose.

"You," he said threateningly, "_stay_."

He could feel the outrage that lashed out from her. She reached up and slapped the hand in her face away forcefully.

"Do not _dare_ give me that chauvinistic white-knight bullshit, _Captain_ _Sparrow_. Attempt to keep me in this cabin and you will experience hell unleashed as you _never_ have before, in ways you cannot _possibly_ imagine without cringing visibly. _Do_ I make myself clear?"

Jack, if possible, looked highly impressed, but not exactly convinced. He lifted his head up, eyeing her dangerously, carefully.

"The last thing I need is a woman runnin' around under foot during a battle, getting herself in distress."

Elizabeth's lips drew back in a smirk and she stepped closer, putting her hand against his chest and applying pressure, shoving him. The layers in his voice made it sound like he knew she would be a target if she were out there, or at least he suspected she'd throw herself in front of someone's gun. The idea he might be worried about her well-being gave her a head-rush of narcotic proportions.

"You know this could be exactly what I need?" she asked quietly, a little pleadingly.

And oh, was it.

He drew back, eyes icy, and yanked open the door.

"You follow _my_ orders, Lizzie, to the letter, or I _will_ make you sorry." He growled, leaving the door open.

Grinning triumphantly, Elizabeth followed him, stepping out and blinking in the suddenly brighter sky. It was morning, and there was blood on the horizon. Jack's shouts bounced off every corner of the ship, and the click of guns being loaded and cannons tested was deafening.

She followed him purposely up to the deck, stood beside him, to the right, next to steering, following his loaded gaze to the closer-than-ever ship.

"Those colors," she said quietly, "who is it?" she asked. Jack didn't answer; his gaze shifted to survey his people, and his hand moved to rest on the wheel in front of him. After a moment, he replied softly:

"_El_ _Petimetre_,"

His Spanish was perfectly accented and fluid, and Elizabeth glanced back again at the other ship's standard, the jester's cap fitting now. She looked at him again, her eyes boring into the back of his turned head. He looked over his crew like a judging God; his facial features set tightly, his muscles rigid and tightly coiled.

"You have any further questions, Miss Swann?" he asked, surprising her with how perceptive he was about her glaring at his head. _As a matter of fact…_

"You prepared for battle. You were sure he would fight. Why?" she asked, voicing her opinions on how odd it was for him to immediately be up for a battle. She was not one of those who considered Jack Sparrow a coward, no, but she did know he avoided violent confrontation simply because she saw beyond the pirate skin and knew he was a good man. He didn't kill unnecessarily.

Jack turned slightly to look at her and she saw penance and hate, anger and sadness, the oddest couples of emotions mixing in his onyx orbs. He just seemed to look at her for an eternity, before a sudden squealing echoed in the air and a crash sounded; a cannon ball had ripped through the wood on top of the ship, all the way at the other end.

"I took everything from him," Jack answered darkly, and whipped back to face his waiting crew.

"_FIRE_," he bellowed, as Elizabeth moved away to the edge, looking at the ship.

She saw the movement there as it got ever closer, saw the crewman preparing a plank to board, and she felt her heart begin to skip beats. To think, fifteen small minutes ago she'd been wrapped in a surprisingly gentle embrace of Jack's, kissing him like there was no tomorrow, and now she was about to engage alongside him in what seemed to be a blood-feud. She squinted more at the embossed name on the ship, which proved to read _Venganza de Beretta._

Smoke puffed out of the sides of their ship, and the shouts escalated. Elizabeth turned to look at Jack and found him with his hand inside his coat at his neck, touching his skin, where a tattoo was, she knew, right below his collar. She narrowed her eyes at him, sensing secrets, a personal grudge, a history that went way back. She started to say something when gunfire ripped through the air next to her, bullets, whistling past her skin and he was next to her, shoving her downstairs in front of him before she knew what was happening, his face tight and furious.

"Board them, BOARD THEM!" he ordered, screaming over the din of the escalating battle. He jerked her away from the side of the boat and shoved his heavy gun into her hand, his eyes meeting hers harshly. She couldn't move her mouth to tell him she had a weapon; something in her had gone numb at the bullets that nearly took her life. She just glared back at him stonily, and acknowledged his small nod. He turned and ran screeching orders, and suddenly half of his crew was gone and strange men were all around, swords clashing and glinting silver in the air.

Elizabeth left the corner and shadows Jack had dragged her into, her head held high, and slipped through the battle for the other ship, ignoring the people around her, searching for the plank.

Someone slammed into her side and she stumbled, reacting instantly to the body that had fallen against her. He continued to fall, fell at her feet, a dirty and unkempt man who was now clearly dead. Elizabeth swallowed, time coming in flashes.

_You like pain? Try wearing a corset!_

_We should get you back to the ship. Your fiancé will want to know you're safe._

Another battle, years back, when youth and innocence had covered ignorance and stupidity. Elizabeth's brow furrowed, her mood darkened. She looked around at all these men, the midst of the fight reminding her of the skeletal men who had set everything in motion to destroy her, and she snapped, needing the release. She leapt lightly across the plank to the _Venganza_ _de_ _Beretta_, her jaw set, her eye determined.

Jack was nowhere to be seen, but Mr. Gibbs was there, locked in combat, as well as Bo'sun, Pintel, Cotton, and several more of the crew members she had never bothered to learn. She was accosted straight away by two men with swords, and she couldn't help but let a smile over-spread her features as she lashed out at one of them, the fear of death giving her the thrill of her life. It wasn't like she hadn't mixed among the dangerous in Tortuga; but still, she was not the swordfighter Jack was, even if Will had taught her how to handle one.

She drew the weapon horizontally across one man's stomach and sent him doubling over; the other suddenly let go of his weapon and dragged her back against him, locking an arm around her neck too tightly. His hand reached down for her thigh and squeezed, Elizabeth turned slightly and elbowed him below the waist—his grip loosened her grip, but before she could get the gun positioned a shot fired and she looked around as her attacker fell at her feet, blood pouring from the back of his head. Jack's eyes met hers from a far distance, and she saw a murderous gleam there.

Someone grabbed her wrist tightly and she swiveled, kicking out at the man who had her. She swung her leg out and knocked him against the side of the ship, feeling her ankle strain in the process. He was dead a second later, though not by her gun, and Mr. Gibbs was dragging her to the side, coughing in the smoke that was going up, looking wary.

"Ye shouldn't be here, Miss 'Lizbeth," he said ominously, looking over his shoulder, shouting as quietly as he could while the men fought behind him. "This bloodbath won't end well, and yer a prime target."

Elizabeth laughed scornfully, pulling out of his grip. Her hair fell frazzled around her face now, the ribbon no doubt gone. She knew she had sprays of blood on her face and neck, and she looked at him defiantly.

"Because I am a woman? What can he do to me, Gibbs, which will hurt me any worse?" she faltered, having not meant to say that to him. He didn't seem to miss a beat, even though she knew she'd just confirmed that something was irrevocably wrong with her.

"He has no feud with _me_," she said quietly. Gibbs started to answer, but instead yanked her to the floor of the _Venganza_. Wood exploded around them and fire erupted; Elizabeth sucked in her breath as a shard of wood slammed against her shoulder and sent a fire through her muscles.

Gibbs shoved her head down as he started to get up, leaning close to her ear so she wouldn't fail to hear what he said next,

"Jack destroyed what this man held dear, and _Petimetre_ will stop at _nothing_ to repay that favor. _Go_, Miss Swann!"

Elizabeth stayed put, stunned for a moment, before grasping for the sword that had been knocked from her hand. The battle raged on all around her, there seemed to be so many men. She finally wrapped her hand around the sword, blinking pain out of her eyes and pulled herself up on her knees, ignoring the agony in her shoulder.

Suddenly, a rough hand took hold of her bare elbow and jerked her up effortlessly, spinning her body tightly against its chest. She found herself forced to stare into the blackest eyes she'd ever seen, filled completely with hatred, surrounded by blood-shot white, complete with a ghastly scar down the center of the nose.

"You'll do _nicely_," he snarled in thickly accented English, a slow and sadistic smile creeping over his thick lips.

"I suppose you're _El_ _Petimetre_," she said in response, bringing her knee up into his groin. The man winced, but did not let go; he twisted her arm behind her back and she sucked in her breath.

Petimetre pulled her head back by the tips of her curls and drew his palm across her cheek violently, viciously enough to smash her nose, and yet she let herself come up from the abuse smiling.

"That all you've got?" she asked, though her voice was slightly impeded by the blood spurting over her face. He snarled at her, and pulled a knife from his belt and held it at her shoulder, putting the tip into her skin. Elizabeth jerked violently to one side, and his grip slipped slightly, but not before he drew the blade down to her elbow, splitting skin. She bit back the scream of pain and instead strained harder, taking the injured arm and dragging her nails down his face, impeding his eye sight. He roared in anger, and threw her back against the side of the ship; she winced as her elbow hit hard.

"I'll put an end to _you_ when we find Sparrow, bitch," he growled, his English miraculously a little clearer on that last word.

"Found him," came Jack's voice from behind _El_ _Petimetre_. Elizabeth struggled to straighten up against the side of the ship, her head a little dizzy from the loss of blood, her memories seeming to overwhelm her. Jack on the island, Will giving himself up for her. Will, teaching her to sword fight when they were children, Will letting her down, everything. Will's innocent and angelic face, and the way everything had fallen apart. Somewhere, more gunfire and cannon fire erupted, and screams reached her through the mist.

Elizabeth looked up, blinking, and saw them in front of her, _El_ _Petimetre_ turned slightly so his back faced her, his vicious glare turned on Jack. Jack held out a weapon; he yelled something violently in perfect Spanish and _Petimetre_ retaliated. The ship shifted next to Elizabeth, and someone was there, shaking her undamaged shoulder. She turned; saw the big, brown eyes of a young boy looking into hers, his face concerned, his outfit a call-back to the everyday outfits of her William, the innocence and drive to help on his face maddening.

"Miss, are you alright? What are you doing in the fight? Miss, may I help you?" he was asking, offering her his hand. So young, so innocent.

His eyes were suddenly Will's, his gallantry Will's, and all she saw was the life he would ruin, the agony he would endure at the hands of the world and maybe a woman, as Will had, the torture the young girl he found would suffer, and she saw blood in her eyes as she shoved him away from her, screaming something. Her peripheral vision caught _El_ _Petimetre_ turning, roaring in Spanish, as she pulled her silver pistol from her waistband and fired between the boy's eyes, adding another two bullets to his chest above the heart, her adrenaline running through her veins, spinning her head, burning in her eyes.

_Petimetre_ descended on her, his gun against her throat, cold, and she thought in that moment she was dead when she heard the three shots that were so loud in her ears; but instead Petimetre collapsed against her and took her down with him, stunned, blinded, lost. She dug her gun into the dead captain's side and used her remaining strength to push him off of her; his blood stained her clothing. She rolled over, blinking tears and sweat away from her cheeks, and her eyes were drawn straight to the dead and bleeding body of the young boy she'd ruthlessly killed.

Jack bent beside her and was picking her up, saying something in Spanish, before he thought better and changed to English mid-sentence. She didn't hear a word, she looked dazedly on the dead boy, his face blurring between Will and who he really was, and she realized what she'd done—he had tried to help her, had wanted to be there for her, and she had murdered him.

"Murder," she mumbled shakily, holding the gun up to her mouth in her hand, the metal and her hot palm touching her lips to steady them. She looked down at the weapon, covered in dark red, and dropped it, her breath shuddering, a small and hoarse scream escaping her lips. "I murdered him," she said again, louder, leaning forward.

Jack tightened his grip, not allowing her to get near the body. He pulled her away, taking her cheek in his hand, smearing blood and sweat on her face.

"Look at me," he was saying, "Lizzie, Lizzie, focus on me…"

His words were nothing to her as he made her look at him, moving them away from the smoke and fire that was _Venganza de Beretta_, his own eyes so full of everything in him that she could easily get lost in his emotions if she let herself.

"I killed him," she breathed, when he stopped at the plank to steady her. Her eyes searched his frantically; she tightened a small hand on his arm, digging her nails into his torn coat, almost screaming now, "I _killed_ him! He…innocent _boy_, he tried to help me…I _murdered_—"

"_Elizabeth_!" he bellowed, taking the arm she had raised against him, subconsciously trying to escape his tight grip. He glared at her with solid eyes and shook his head. He pulled her in close to his side and stepped on the plank in front of her, getting them back to his less-damaged ship safely and expertly.

"_Report_, Mr. Gibbs!" he snapped loudly enough to be heard over the din. Gibbs responding, shouting something, how many men they'd lost. Elizabeth's head swirled; she leaned forward in Jack's grips and vomited, her stomach lurching violently. She shook, her knife wound burning in the back of her mind. A sob escaped her split lip and she tasted blood as she squeezed her eyes shut, sinking down to the deck on her knees, her mind playing tricks on her, the boy's face and Will's, then Jack's, and every hurtful word that had ever been said. Her stomach lurched again and she retched, the taste in her mouth sour and unpleasant.

Jack placed his hand on her head and ran it back down over her hair, his orders issuing loudly overhead, just another sound in the mix of the chaotic and blurry world around her that was slowly getting harder to hold onto. A shadow fell over her and he swept her up into his arms, her sore shoulder pressed against his blood-soaked shirt. Her head fell against his shoulder and she opened her eyes; he was carrying her through the muddle of people towards his cabin. Her vision was a haze of red, her mind a whirl of too much, and the clearest thing to her was his steadily fast heartbeat beneath her ear.

She wasn't hurt fatally; she just wasn't held together anymore. Elizabeth moaned and a fresh cry issued from her. Jack's arms were firm and safe, and he said something to her in Spanish, in a harsh and strained tone, and she heard it clearly—though she didn't understand it—even through the daze, the nightmare she was in:

"_Usted ahora teine su absolucion, Lizzie."_

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*You have your absolution now, Lizzie." (Forgive the Spanish, I used an online translator)

Last time, I believe the servers were down, as I couldn't reveiw any of the stories I were reading. So slack is cut. Reveiw, please, readers. It's nice.

--Sing for Absolution, Muse


	14. Disasterpiece

**A/N: I'm glad I kept my word and got this chapter up sooner:] The next one might not come so quick, but I'm very eager to write it, so it could. Thanks SO much to those who always review; its very nice of you. Those of you who don't....try it! Please?**

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**Chapter Fourteen: Disasterpiece**

Jack kicked a chair out from his desk and set Elizabeth down in it, kneeling on one knee next to her and pushing the hair that was glued to her face by blood out of her eyes, behind her ears. He muttered in Spanish still, noting her jump and wince as he shouted something out the open cabin door to get Mr. Gibbs's attention.

"Medical," he grunted when his loyal mate appeared in the doorway. Gibbs nodded curtly and turned around, back to giving orders. Jack was reaching around for the arm on her other side, pulling it across her lap and wrapping his palm around the deepest part of the cut, stemming the flow of blood. Pain shot up her arm as the wound pulsed angrily. She closed her eyes tightly and dropped her head, digging her teeth into her bottom lip.

Gibbs reappeared in the doorway with a bundle of something and a wooden box in his hands; Jack gestured to the bed and the other man tossed them there, hesitating, waiting for orders.

"The crew? Damage?" Jack asked shortly.

"Minimal, though the crew's a'ready celebratin'. No need to worry 'bout them," Gibbs responded on the spot. Jack snorted and shook his head, half in annoyance.

"Repairs come first. Then drinks, go." He snapped. When he didn't hear his first mate move away to start yelling reprimands at the unruly crew, he looked up, found Mr. Gibbs watching Elizabeth with concern. "She'll be fine, Mr. Gibbs, _GO_."

Jack got up and slammed the door shut after the older man, turning and leaning against it. He narrowed his eyes at her bowed head, staring into her tangled hair like he might be able to penetrate bone and see what was written on the inside of her skull. Her shoulders shuddered and she held one at an awkward angle; there was too much blood on her for all of it to be hers. What had gotten in her head, to make her cross ships? She was still crying.

He went to the medical supplies Gibbs had brought up and wrenched open the box, forgetting where he had placed the key. He found the precious bottle of unguent and a roll of clean cloth, and on top of that took out a few dried out leaves and a strip of rough burlap. He went to her again and stooped in front of her, reaching for the ties on her vest and loosening them, pulling it off.

He lifted the arm from her lap and surveyed the long cut, from mid-shoulder to the crook of her elbow, and started at the top, soaking a strip of the cloth he'd pulled from the bed with the unguent and pressing it firmly against the deepest part of the gash, then drawing it down the length of it, eliciting a hiss of pain from her as he cleansed the cut and wiped the blood away. It took only a swipe or two to clear all the blood off of her arm, and he made a point not to react to her small noises of protest as he poured rum directly over the wound. He unraveled a length of cloth and started wrapping at her shoulder, pulling it tight, securing every bit of open skin, and tying it off at a point just below her elbow.

He stopped and looked at his handiwork, satisfied that the worst bleeding was stopped, and hesitated, looking at the strip of burlap in his palm. He looked up at her and then at the shoulder, knowing it was dislocated. He looked again at her head, bent, and shielded by matted hair. She suddenly looked up at him, blindly, a bruise starting to color her face, blood drying under her nose and over her lips. He stood up and moved to her right side, holding out the strip of material.

"Bite," he ordered softly, in a tight voice. She looked at him blankly and opened her mouth, clamping her teeth down on the burlap as she was told, looking at him. He put one hand on her shoulder and one on her back behind her shoulder, a little beneath her shoulder blade.

"Look away," he said sharply. Elizabeth blinked at him and slowly turned her head; he saw her jaw start to clench and her eyes draw closed, the corners wrinkling as she held them shut tightly.

He set his strength and jerked her shoulder backwards and then forward again, bracing her with one arm, hearing the loud snap as the bone relocated. She shrieked, the sound muffled by her closed mouth but too loud to his ears all the same. He ran his hand down her arm and knelt beside her again, reaching up to her face.

"Don't _ever_ do that again," she snarled, moving her head away from his hand. Despite the situation, he allowed a ghost of a smile across his features. At least she hadn't completely lost her mind, as he had initially feared.

"Look at me, Lizzie," he said, pressing his knuckles against her cheek. She turned her face into them, reluctantly looking. He reached downwards towards the desk, produced a bottle of electrically green liquid from nowhere, and held it up. Elizabeth raised an eyebrow weakly.

"Drink as much of this as you've been swillin' me rum, you won't think for days." He said, tilting it towards her. The absinthe coaxed and called to her, whispering of sweet release and delirium, and she found herself rejecting that. She had things to dwell on sober.

"I don't want it," she mumbled, looking away again. Jack stood up, setting the bottle down loudly on the table's corner next to her, letting it tempt her. He didn't know if that was best for her, to not take the drink, but he let her have it her way.

"You'd be ill-advised not to down a shot, lass," he said neutrally, "that shoulder will ache for hours."

She shook her head slightly, shifting her bandaged arm and resting the hand in her lap.

"It hurts; I'll get over it."

Ah, the layered sentence of the day. Jack watched her for a split second and then turned away, maneuvering through the cabin to the jumble of things in the back, removing his now-tattered and bloody coat as he went. He dropped it unceremoniously onto the floor and kicked it away, removing his crimson-soaked shirt as well and rummaging through a box for a different one.

Before he slipped on the whiter, less-used thin shirt he found, he took from the top of his boot a frayed loop of silk with a tiny glass bird on it, something he'd removed from _Petimetre_ after the slaughter on the _Venganza_. He dropped it over his head and around his neck wordlessly, letting it settle with his other trinkets at the base of his throat, and put on the shirt, kicking the box a little angrily to alleviate some madness. As he stood up and glared silently at the mess of things in the back of his cabin, his eyes ran over to the very back, where a petite and intricately decorated trunk sat in the corner, taunting him. His fist clenched at his side, and a wave of pleasure rolled over him as he called back the sight of _Petimetre's_ mangled body at his feet.

Behind him, Elizabeth had started to cry quietly, as if she were desperately trying to hide it…no, he knew she was desperately trying to hide it. He turned and glanced at her figure, slumped in the chair, tensed but lax at the same time. She'd shown a brutality today that had made even him widen his eyes as he'd watched her violent act, and yet he did not judge her, just hesitated to ask.

_You know this could be exactly what I need?_

Maybe he did know why she'd done it. He'd done things like this before, things he regretted—or didn't, depending on the circumstances—things that sprung out of anger and hate and a need to cleanse the soul by making others hurt like he had, or she had. Absolution in the most wicked of ways.

Jack approached her calmly, sitting down on the bed and leaning casually against the headboard, his hands behind his head. He still let his eyes settle on her, waiting, his one ear picking up signs of laughter and celebration coming through the shut door from the deck.

After what seemed like an eternity of watching, she suddenly turned to him, looking up, her eyes dark and immovable, face still grimed with the remnants of battle and the kill. Her gaze locked on his fiercely for a split second before she spoke.

"Why do you continue to stare at me like that?" she demanded in a low growl.

Jack didn't answer straight away. He took in her still slightly trembling frame and the rigidity of her muscles. His eyes drifted back up to her face and he slowly shrugged his shoulders, lifting an eyebrow.

"You can't let it drive you mad, Elizabeth," was his only response.

Her eyes flickered and flared. Her lips curled up in a scowl; she looked down and then back up at him, defiantly and disbelievingly.

"I murdered a man," she snapped—then hesitated. "A boy," she corrected more quietly, her lips shaking. She licked them, ignoring the coppery taste of blood. "A stranger who offered me help."

Her pupils seemed to grow tiny as water coated her eyes and her eyelashes caught tears before they fell again; her cheeks paled a shade beneath the blood on her face. She looked down to the hand in her lap, at the blood on it that Jack hadn't cleaned off. Literal blood on her hands.

_Murder_.

"I've killed before." Jack said stonily, his own repressed and black memories flashing in black and grey and light blue before his eyes. He wanted nothing more than to light them on fire like he had the old pictures that had been so painful at first.

Elizabeth almost scoffed at him.

"And those are your words of wisdom?" she snarled. She shifted her position in the chair, trying to find comfort for her many injuries. "Not like this," she mumbled softly.

"Elizabeth," Jack said evenly, drawing her attention back to him. Her glare was stony and set, as if she was prepared to be impressed by whatever philosophy he was going to dump on her. "Why did you kill him?"

He knew the question would make or break her, send her into a flaming rage at him or bring out the reasons she didn't want to face and eventually, after filling her with irrevocable guilt, help her move on.

"I...I don't know." She snapped, turning away.

"Ah, lying does no good. Yes, you do," Jack reprimanded sagely, from experience. He waited a moment, and when she didn't turn her eyes back to him or start yelling angrily, he went on gently, coaxingly.

"You have to face it, Lizzie."

She didn't say a word; but she unclenched her jaw, moving her lips and shaking her head slightly, then closing her eyes and opening them, blinking them rapidly.

"He had brown eyes, like wet sand." She said, barely audibly. Jack let her talk, remembering his own struggle with something so similar. "He was so young."

"It was in the heat of battle. All's fair in war." Jack prompted, knowing it would draw out her anger and her guilt, aware that it was what she needed to let it out.

"_He_ didn't touch me, it wasn't his _fight_!" Elizabeth cried angrily, turning to glare at Jack as if he had no heart. "He tried to help. His eyes were so pure…"

"Then why did you kill him?"

"Stop!"

"Why did you kill him, Elizabeth?" Jack demanded louder, in a more forceful tone. She leapt out of the chair and flew forward, closer to where he was on the bed, a few tears escaping down her cheeks.

"_He_ _was_ _Will_!" she screamed at him, her un injured moveable arm going up to her hair and over her head. She winced at the pain in her shoulder, turned away and turned back. "He was too young, too gallant! Because he was stupid and he'd grow up and he'd…because he might get hurt, or hurt some girl like me…ruin someone…he was _WILL_ and he had _Will's_ eyes and he…and I…"

Her rant broke off in a choking gasp and she backed up against the wall next to the chair, lashing out and kicking it over, reaching over to cradle her shoulder as she slid to the floor , leaning her head back against the wall, her hand in her hair and over her face, crying.

"He was innocent," she sobbed, shaking her head, "I don't even know who he was," she said, her voice thick and hoarse.

Jack moved from the bed and took the chair she'd violently accosted, setting it right and sitting down in it, leaning back with his hand on his knee. He put a hand to his face and rubbed his forehead, drawing it down over his eyes and mouth, relief and triumph in his veins. He watched her hate herself and struggle with her actions and made a choice.

"Felix Sly," he said slowly, only loud enough so she could hear him over her noise. She didn't visibly react, but he knew she was listening. "_El_ _Petimetre's_ son, heir."

"You _knew_ him?" her whisper was horrified and desperate.

Jack looked at a spot beyond her head darkly, for once not the one who wanted eye contact. He nodded imperceptibly, mind throwing back years, to a young girl with laughing eyes and a man who'd ruined everything.

"I knew _Eduardo_ Sly. _Petimetre_." He stopped again and looked at her briefly, noticing her rapt stare. "It's a long story, Lizzie." He muttered, rubbing his mouth with his fingers, accidentally cutting his lip with a ring. It was a day for blood, apparently.

"You owe me," she whispered, and he almost caught himself smiling. _Touché, my dear_.

"Eight years ago," Jack said against his hand, then pulling it away from his mouth and resting it on the table next to him, clutching wood in his hand. "Eduardo murdered someone I…loved. Took everything. ."

This was too hard. Even Gibbs didn't know the first part of this story. He only knew the horrible accident that should never have happened, that was legend and that blackened Jack's background to horrifying pirate and not revenge driven, guilt-ridden vigilante.

Jack captured her eyes again, making sure she was aware, silently telling her to turn back now.

"I took it _back_."

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--I don't know if I put the translations last time, but 'El Petimetre' is 'The Coxcomb' and Vengenza de Beretta is 'Beretta's Revenge'

--Disasterpeice by Slipknot


	15. My Plague

**A/N: I'm going to go ahead and put it out there that this was the hardest chapter I've ever had to write. Ever. Bar none. Simply because the terrirory was so unexplored and I was so afraid of this just totally not working in regards to Jack. In the end, I'm comfortable with it. He's blunt without being cold, and yet I think you can tell he's upset. Hey, he's human. I apologize, again, for the wait. Read on, Macduff.**

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**Chapter Fifteen: My Plague**

"You've heard the stories," Jack said slowly, cradling his trusted bottle of rum in his hands, looking at Elizabeth harshly. "You can recite them."

For some reason, she took it as an order to do just that. She felt her throat unstuck and her tongue loosen as she looked at him, dutifully listing off what she'd read and been fascinated by as a young child—even still as a teenager.

"Discovered the lost treasure of Cortés. Single-handedly commandeered and pillaged a fleet of Dutch ships. Acquired the fastest ship in the world. Sacked Port Nassau without firing a single shot…and the list goes on."

At the last, his gaze got sharper and he elevated his gaze to just over her shoulder, looking at her without really looking at her.

"I fired a shot." He said, and something about the way he said it gave her a feeling of dread and despair. "One shot."

His voice was so far away now.

"I wasn't always a pirate," he said, and Elizabeth discreetly raised an eyebrow. How exactly was she supposed to see him as anything else? Still, she couldn't speak, so fascinated was she to hear Jack speak. He had a smooth voice, like someone you'd want to read you your bedtime stories. And he was telling a real one, revealing his past. Curious as she'd always been, she pretty much considered that an off limits topic.

"…joined the East India Trading company when I was nineteen...working for a Cutler Beckett."

Elizabeth bit back the derisive snort that bubbled to her lips at the job he said he'd held. The Jack Sparrow she knew would have sold his soul before involving himself with any law-abiding citizens.

"I'd sworn I'd never be the pirate scum my father was…vowed I'd be a better man. Working on these trading ships…conditions were harsh, worse than even the _Pearl_ can be, but it was honest work. _Honest_,"

He snorted, his eyes darkening to onyx, sparking.

"We were told not to look in the cargo holds, to do our jobs and shut the hell up. I looked. We weren't carrying cloth and spices, Miss Swann," he said slowly, transferring his eyes back to her.

He took a long drink of his rum, wiping his mouth with the back of his hands.

"There were hundreds of Africans down there. Children. Human cargo. '_Honest_ _men'_ made their money bartering slaves," a grim smirk spread over Jack's face, his head leaning back a little.

"I let' em go. Cost the company hundreds of thousands. They arrested me, threw me in prison, branded me a pirate. And thus…I became one."

He was grinning, but it was an ironic smile that didn't reach his dark eyes. Elizabeth swallowed, mesmerized, drawn away from her own internal pain and into his, into his world. He glared at her, his smile failing a little, as he reached up to his hair and fingered a delicately decorated bead she'd seen him touch absently before.

"'S how it started, anyhow." He said, looking off again. "Your governments, your authorities. You think we come from nowhere, we have no families. You think we're bad." He scoffed; glaring at her again, like his lifestyle was her fault.

And in a way, it was. At least, her aristocracy's.

"I had a family." He said darkly, eyes boring into hers. "Wasn't much of one. I had Carolina."

Elizabeth tilted her head at him, her pulse quickening. She reached up and gently massaged her injured shoulder, focused completely on him, the air thick with unspoken words and questions. He had stopped, and after a moment, it didn't seem like he would continue. He was staring again. A few minutes later, Elizabeth pursed her lips, and asked:

"Who…who was she?"

Eyes snapped back to hers. He drank again. The cabin seemed darker; she noticed it was late, pitch black outside if she judged by the windows.

"My sister."

"_I missed you! What did you bring me, Johnny?"_

"_Been good while I was gone, Carrie?"_

"_Me? You're the one off robbing the empire!"_

Her sweet laughter rang in his ears and he shut his eyes, tilting his head away, against the neck of the welcoming rum bottle. He felt Elizabeth's eyes on him, and regretted ever pushing her to tell him her story. This is how she had felt. Exposed. Watched, stripped, and judged. She must have loathed him as he loathed her right now.

Even if he volunteered the story. Even if catharsis was good.

She said something, but he didn't hear it. He was too busy remembering. Remembering her.

"_You saved those poor people, John!"_

"_Look at what they forced me to become, Carrie. Everything I despised about Teague. They've shredded my morals, I'm leaving you alone—"_

"_You didn't! Johnny, you didn't! You kept your morals when you let those Africans go! I would have done it! And I'm proud of you."_

"_I'm a pirate."_

"_I don't care, be a damn good one!"_

"_It's despicable."_

"_You're my brother. I love you. Now go…and bring me some silks from China."_

He wanted to see her shining brown eyes again, and watch her face light up as she twirled around in the garden of the house in Spain, prancing with whatever trinket he'd brought her from a faraway land.

"Jack? Jack, what happened to her?"

Elizabeth asked softly, from the bed. He suspected she'd already spoken to him a thousand times.

It was painful to remember. It only made the present bad and the prospect of the future worse.

"I wasn't there to protect her," Jack snapped in response, his eyes flashing open, and yet the black and white memories still swimming before his eyes.

_The white cottage with the vines in Barcelona, out by the sea near the sand, where she let the waves chase her, and laid on the beach pointing out constellations at night._

_The market where she loved to barter with the merchants and tease the butcher's son, who he'd always thought she had really been fond of to the point of love._

_Her books and her fairytales and the way she'd acted out whatever he'd missed, making him play different parts. Her tears when she thought about her mother, and her anger, just as bitter as his, at their father._

"Jack."

Elizabeth's soft voice again. Surprisingly soft. He looked at her like she was some kind of sea creature, confused at hearing the gentle and caring tone of the young girl he'd met so many years ago, who'd bravely taken on Barbossa to save her then-loved one.

She was right next to him now, laying a hand on his arm, standing by the chair he was in. He pulled it away to drink again, and realized it suddenly didn't seem quite so narcotic anymore.

Elizabeth reached up to his hair and touched the bead he'd previously played with. She ran her fingers over the smooth surface, the Japanese symbol that had been carefully painted on it, that was now faded so much. She let her hand fall to his chest, where she pushed aside his open shirt to find the tattoo he'd touched earlier, before they had boarded the _Venganza de Beretta_ and he'd stared so absentmindedly into the horizon.

His skin was warm beneath her fingers as she traced the outline of the smallest Japanese characters she'd ever seen, tattooed onto his chest above his heart, scrawled in black script elegantly over the emblem of a sparrow. She couldn't read it, didn't know its significance, but she looked up, eyes again meeting his.

"Tell me." She said simply, demanding he finish his story.

"I took care of her. I was all she had. She was terrified of our father, hated him and his cruelty, and I was there to take the brunt for her…when he stopped coming back, she danced in the rain for hours. She was five years my junior. She laughed, she sang, she loved. Everything. And the only mistake she ever made was catching the attention of that slimy bastard."

Jack said harshly, seemingly beginning his background story.

"I started leaving when Carolina was fourteen, with the Company. Making money, keeping her safe. When I went Rogue, after prison, when I finally got back to her, I hated what I'd become and she was the one who knocked some sense into me. Reminded me that I'd acted for the good of humans, instead of the greed. I brought her things back from the places I went. Kept her safe."

Jack got up from his chair, shoving it away under the table and moving past Elizabeth to the bed, where he sat down with the absinthe and leaned back, the arm that held the bottle propped up on one leg. His head tilted to the side and he stared at Elizabeth blankly, as if shutting his mind down and running on some kind of half-awake stream of conscious.

"_He leers at me. I thought he was a gentleman."_

"_Why didn't you tell me about this sooner? I've been leaving you alone, he could have hurt you."_

"_I got out…I thought he was a good man, John. But...he watches me now. He pursues me. I'm scared of him."_

"_Carolina, I know the bastard. I know the stories. You trust too easily."_

"_His eyes are kind."_

"_And you say he scares you!"_

"_Please…John, don't over react…Jack. I've got Mr. Butcher to duel him for me."_

_His sister giggled, twisting her ring finger nervously, her eyes bright._

"_He touches a hair on your head and I'll kill him, Carolina."_

"When she was sixteen she caught the eyes of the count, this…preying bastard. Took what he wanted, abused his women, and took delight in the submissive girl. Carolina was young, innocent. She was attractive. And sweet. She was kind to everyone. When he showed an interest in her, she found him friendly, handsome. I started coming home to find her bruised a little, scared; she didn't hesitate to tell me what was going on. He scared her. He tried to persuade her to sleep with him. He wanted her; she refused him. Carolina was in love with someone else…she begged me not to, but I sought him out. Threatened him. Swore I'd kill him if he so much as looked at her wrong."

Jack's sardonic, disgusted smirk came back and he shook his head, lifting the bottle to his lips. It burned as it ran down his throat, stinging his eyes and muscles.

"He didn't take kindly to that."

"_Petimetre_." Elizabeth said softly. He didn't have to nod or say a thing to confirm she was right.

She had been sitting in his recently vacated chair but now she stood, coming to the end of the bed and sitting on a trunk, leaning over to rest her upper body and chin on the mattress and blankets.

Elizabeth felt a very deep sadness emanating from Jack. She felt like she was stepping on eggshells, holding a gun that was about to go off of its own will in her hand, pointed at her heart.

She'd never heard him talk like this. She'd never imagined him with a family, with someone he loved. She'd certainly never thought of him as someone who hated piracy, and who wanted nothing more than to live an honest life. She looked at him raptly, waiting. She wouldn't push him like he had pushed her. She felt her muscles start to unclench and relax; even her mind seemed to ease a little, like proverbial walls were cracking. She watched.

"I wasn't gone long, that time. It was storming when I came back; the waves were more dangerous than I'd ever seen them, made it hard to get to the beach where I docked the _Pearl _before I found Carolina. There were bloody footprints in the sand, and a torn piece of a yellow dress I'd brought her from the Americas. The trees and gardens around the cottage were in flames. I found her in her bedroom."

Jack turned his head toward the bedside table, and Elizabeth slowly followed his gaze. She wondered if the light blue handkerchief that had been tied around the candlestick there had any significance, as that was what he glared at now.

"I will never forget the blood. He raped her. Slit her throat. And left her."

Elizabeth's eyes stung in a way they hadn't in a while. In sadness and in sympathy, where tears had usually only come in anger or hate when they had made an appearance. Jack's voice had taken on its dead quality again.

"Sick son of a bitch was gone. His manor was left, deserted, his wife disappeared, his son left with a family member in Madrid. Carolina was dead, and he was gone. I snapped," he stopped, voice quieting, his eyes staring off. He'd forgotten she was here. "I went after him. Let it consume me for months. Almost a year."

"_Did you find your pretty sister, little Teague?"_

"Then I found him. Livin' la Vida dolce. Port Nassau. He _was_ Port Nassau."

"_Aye, yes, Mr. Sparrah, was it? 'E showed up…coupla months ago…"_

"_He's ruined my daughter and me wife. We think he mightah poisoned his pre-decessor._

"I went after him. In the night, but he took it into the streets. Woke the whole town."

"_She cried for you. Cried your name while I took her…seemed odd to me, but I like to think she enjoyed it—"_

"_I will kill you. Stand up and fight, you cowardly fucking son of a bitch, fight someone who can take you!"_

"_Pretty thing…whisp of a girl…so ripe and ready for plucking…"_

"_Daddy! Daddy, look—"_

_BANG._

"He shouted every detail. Illustrated what he did. Mocked her. We fought. I was mad with rage. Hell-bent on killing him…I didn't expect her. Didn't _see_ her. She ran out in the dark…" he trailed off, his head cocked again. His hand moved to his bead again. "Petimetre's daughter, probably the only thing the man honest-to-god adored and cared for sincerely. He picked her up and held in her in front of him, grinning madly, _daring_. It happened fast…too fast…he swept her up, I pulled the trigger."

The silence fell like the axe of execution, Jack's terrible words hanging in the air. Elizabeth reached out and touched his leg, where the breeches cut off the bare skin, her fingers curling around his ankle. He pulled away.

"I hit her in the forehead."

Elizabeth drew her lip between her teeth, drawing her hand back and cradling her wrist, feeling like her own scars were branded white hot all over her. He still stared away into the distance.

Then he looked at her. His eyes were hollow, dead and black. Fathomless. She stared at him until he finally moved, tossed the bottle of acid green liquid to the floor with a clang and a shatter, that spewed liquid everywhere and caused shards of glass to fly all over.

And he left her; his words almost visible in the air.

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**My Plague** by Slipknot

**Please review, I'd love feedback especially on this chapter:]**


	16. Jigsaw Memory

**A/N: Quicker update, and the rest will be quicker. Only two more chapters after this, and they are typed, edited, and ready to go, so its just at my will that this story be finally finished:] Maybe a few nice reviews would entice me to update faster? Yes, yes. Enjoy!**

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**Chapter Sixteen: Jigsaw Memory**

It felt like hours that she sat there; rooted to her spot, in the cold atmosphere he left behind. Her eyes, moist and wide, stared without seeing at the wooden cabin door, her mind in a million different places.

When she did get up, she automatically went to pick up the dangerous shards of glass his fit of rage had produced, swiping a rag off the table to mop up the liquid mess before it could seep everywhere, or cause someone to fall. Mechanically, she cleaned up, closing her eyes every once in a while, trying not to think of the horror and the immeasurable guilt Jack must have dealt with. Still dealt with…would always dealt with.

Her problems seemed to shrivel in front of her, and still she felt how acutely alike they were suddenly.

She stood; holding the rag in her hand, looking at the glass cupped tenderly in her other palm.

Elizabeth carefully transferred the bits of glass into the cloth and wrapped it up, setting it carefully in the middle of the table, where it was less likely to slide off should they run into a rough patch in the ocean. She turned towards the back of the cabin, the focal point of Jack's locked gaze through some of his story, and walked towards it, remembering the many trunks, one in particular, that she'd seen while snooping around in here a few weeks ago.

She stepped into the mass of junk, carefully picking out clear places to anchor her feet, and found what she was looking for towards the very, very back, hidden between the bookshelf and the farthest wall. She pushed a few boxes gently out of the way and knelt down in front of the deep brown trunk, her fingers tracing over the chipped and faded paint that arched across the latch on top.

_Carolina_

She bit her lip and only hesitated a moment before lifting open the trunk slowly, ignoring the dust that floated upwards and agitated her nostrils.

The floral scent nearly overwhelmed her as she leant back on her heels. Scattered haphazardly over the once-neat contents were tons of Spanish bluebells, all wilted a little but miraculously preserved all the same. Elizabeth picked one up and held it in her palm, twirling the stem between her thumb and forefinger, and lay it gently back down where she'd gotten it, moving on.

There wasn't much there. No clothes. Just…trinkets. Personal belongings. It hurt to think he'd kept them, and yet it painted a picture of his humanity so clear that it was blinding. How could they ever brand these vagabond men as nothing but cruel robbers? Of course there were those who were, plain and simple, that. But then there were men like Jack.

She ran her fingers over the many silk ribbons in the trunk, each brightly colored, one with an embossed _C_ threaded on it in white string. Lots of yellows and blues. Underneath the many ribbons and bluebells was a single pair of shoes; simple beaded satin slippers, a butter yellow with cloth pink roses. Next to the shoes, Elizabeth's fingers found the thinnest silk ribbon, knotted in a circle; a necklace. She picked it up delicately, pursing her lips.

The charm on the end was none other than a glass sparrow. Sculpted neatly, flawlessly, with its wings spread in flight, a single tiny sapphire made its eye, the only color on the whole necklace besides the palest blue of the ribbon itself. She laid the glass figurine against her palm, curious for the first time as to why exactly Jack called his surname 'Sparrow'.

Elizabeth ran her finger over the smooth glass again, and set the necklace back down gently. In the corner were the last of the trunk's contents—that is, beyond they small trinkets such as thimbles and earrings. She sat back, cross-legged, and held the worn leather bound book of paper in her lap, moving a dusty book of psalms to the side. As she looked at the cover of what had been Jack's sister's sketchbook, she felt like she knew something about the girl who seemed to have completely influenced who Jack was today.

Feeling less like she was trespassing, Elizabeth lifted the cover of the book and tilted her head, looking at the expert drawing on the first page. A butterfly perched on a sunflower. The next were mostly the same, pictures of nature: A cottage with green vines sidling up the side, a mass of trees, an expansive beach with a single dog at the ocean's edge, even the view of a little market from a fixed point, complete with a boy playing next to a cart of apples. Elizabeth smiled at the talent and the beauty of it; she'd ever been useless at art, no matter how hard her mother and then her tutor had tried to teach her.

She flipped past the pages of flowers and animals until she came to the last page in the book, where she stopped, and touched her fingers to the page. It was by far the best of the bunch; a drawing of Jack at the helm of his ship, and a girl sitting on the edge of the ship to the left of him, laughing. She didn't need anyone to tell her it was Carolina; the girl looked just like him.

Black hair, wide eyes, and a grin that matched his for all its smirk and character. Looking closer, Elizabeth could just make out the tiny likeness of a sparrow necklace at Carolina's throat. She closed the sketch book, swallowing hard, and replaced the book of psalms on top of it, then putting them both back into the dark corner of the trunk and closing it slowly, enveloping the memories in darkness once again.

She turned around and leaned against the trunk, drawing her knees up a little, cramped in the messy space in the back of his cabin. Jack had done everything he could to preserve the memory of his family, of the one person who showed him who he was, and she had done everything she could to destroy that person in her own life.

She was going to have to face the other side eventually. Even if it painted her black and made her want to turn her back and shake her head. Tortuga had been a hotbed of self-pity and independence, it was easy there to lay blame and hold anger, to convince yourself you were innocent and others had wronged you. Hell, it was just easier that way. Period. But it was wrong.

Here it wasn't so easy. Here it was open and free and (mostly) quiet…and with men like Jack around with stories like his…it was downright judgmental.

She reached into her bodice and disentangled the compass, pulling it out.

_Then I'm to assume you know how?_

_I've had a better idea, of late._

What the hell did he mean? He stared at this bloody compass day in and out, he trusted it like no other, and yet it was _broken_.

She glared at it, willing it to spill its secrets. Why had Gibbs even brought this mystery to her attention? Was it something she should figure out, something about Jack she should know? Her head spun. She popped open the mechanism and watched the needle spin, not as fast as it had the last time she'd opened it. It lazily swirled this time, from the bed to the wall behind her, to herself directly and finally to the cabin's door. This compass had gotten Jack to Isla de Muerta without a second thought five years ago, and it didn't even point north.

It didn't point north.

Elizabeth suspiciously looked closer at the compass. A light went on in her mind, for what she didn't know. She looked up from the needle's current fixed point and found the cabin's door in her vision. Standing up, she shut it and held the compass and held it in her palm, measuring the weight. She gingerly picked her way out of the mess and towards the exit, stepping out into the waning day, looking around.

The mess and damage was nearly cleaned up; the broken wood and spilt food and drink almost completely clear. Sails were back up, tears all but gone, and Gibbs was standing in the middle of the ship with a sharp eye, ordering final pickups, knowing the crew was just eager for the drinks of victory. He was hard-pressed getting an decent work out of them, as they all chattered and sang loudly over the orders of the first mate.

Mr. Gibbs eyes scanned over the ship and his men, and met hers as she pulled Jack's door shut behind her. She held up the compass slightly, and his head jerked backwards. She nodded and started forward, craning her neck around him and the mast, looking for the Captain. She found him examining a chunk that had been taken out of the starboard side where they'd kissed this morning, muttering orders to Bo'sun. He looked up, saw her approaching, and snapped a dismissal at the man, who gave Elizabeth a rather curious look. She waited until he was out of earshot completely and stepped up, her head tilted at Jack. She held out her hand, the compass held flat in her palm, offering.

"I can't figure it out, Jack," she said, shrugging her shoulders lightly, smiling sadly. "What does it do, if it's not broken?" she asked, hoping on the off chance he'd give her an answer instead of some cryptic riddle. He surprised her.

He looked at her like some resigned school teacher and took it, holding it in three fingers in front of her, looking her in her eyes.

"This compass, Miss Swann, shows you what you most want."

It was a shocking revelation but at the same time, she strangely felt no shock. Unbeknownst to her, she'd figured that out subconsciously, she'd known by herself. She managed a raised eyebrow and a sort of sarcastic smile as she glanced down at her feet and back up, squinting a little in the sun.

"Then it won't do a damn thing for me," she said with a derisive snort, shaking her head at him.

Who was she kidding? She turned her back on him and rested her palm on the edge of the ship, running it along as she started to leave, uncaring of splinters. His hand came over hers and stopped her; he let their palms touch and then released her hand as he came around in front of her, tucking the compass into his belt. Without looking at her, he said:

"You used to remind me of her."

She didn't have to ask who as he walked off, giving a few orders, adjusting his hat, taking his place back at the wheel.

She watched him go, her eyes stinging. Those words cut her deeper than anything he'd ever said, any action she'd ever done, anything Will had ever said. She felt exposed and judged before him and herself, and the higher powers as well. She looked up, blinking, and then back over at his back as he retreated up the stairs.

So many mistakes and so much misplaced blame.

"JACK," she called after him. "Jack."

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"Jigsaw Memory" by **Muse**

**Thoughts? Review.**


	17. Unfinished Song

**A/N: This is the 'official' end, though there will of course be an epilogue. This was my favorite chapter, and I do hope everyone enjoys it and likes how things unfold. This is how it should be, it's more true to human nature. Anyway, I'll stop babbling. Thank you all for the nice reviews, they were very kind:] Do it again!**

**Chapter Seventeen: Unfinished Song**

"Jack,"

She stopped him at the very top of the stairs, a little breathless from the running. He turned a little when she caught his coat in her fist, jerking him to a stop. He looked at her with mild surprise in his eyes and looked down at her hand with a quirked eyebrow. Slowly, Elizabeth let the material slide through her fingers and let go, flexing her fingers and stepping up past him onto the deck, walking towards the end of the ship, hugging herself, and glancing out into the sea before turning back. He stepped up onto the deck fully and gave her an un-interpretable look, leaning back against the railing.

"Lizzie," he responded neutrally, waiting.

She chewed on her lip and just looked at him, helplessly.

"You're a good man," she said, her voice trembling. "Jack, you're a _good_ man."

He blinked at her, and tilted his head a little, a look on his face like he figured she might have finally lost her mind. She shook her head and squeezed her own arm, trying to push herself onward.

"An' why do you say that, Lizzie?" he asked, his eyebrow drifting higher, his voice a little gruff, sarcastic.

"Look what you've done. You became the one thing you hated in order to set free some strangers from a life of bondage. You spend your days trying to make up for one accident. You didn't give up on me. You _saved_ Will."

"Trifles, Elizabeth."

She detected a dangerous edge to his voice, underlying a dismissal. She refused to be daunted by it. They were in too deep now. They knew the ins and outs and the light and dark of each other's character. Or…he knew most of the dark.

"Do you have any idea what kind of person I am?" she asked, her throat aching with the effort of speaking against tears. Her eyes moistened and she looked at her bare feet momentarily, then back up at him through wet eyelashes. "The things I've done?"

He snorted, mockingly, stepping a little closer.

"You've come to expunge _your_ sins, Lizzie? Neither of us is perfect, love. You've been sinned _against_; is this your way of explaining it? Making yourself into some sort of criminal? You're no martyr, Miss Swann. Never were."

She shook her head; how to tell him? Blow the whole thing wide open.

"I'm not a martyr, Jack," she said quietly, her lips parted slightly as she met her eyes. "I'm the crucifier."

The captain looked at her questioningly; Elizabeth went on before her other self could stop her; she fought against the person she'd been for the past few years.

"I'm selfish, I'm spoiled. I'm an undeserving bitch and whore by choice; I'm not a victim, Jack."

"What the hell are you on about, girl?"

"You don't know the half of it,"

"You blame yourself for everything, Lizzie, when—"

"I sabotaged my marriage!"

Elizabeth snapped into his words, interrupting him, shutting him up instantly. He looked at her calculatingly, his eyes locked on hers, as he sized her up.

"Did you hear me, _Captain_? I, me, myself! I wasn't just an innocent bystander in the sordid affair. I was the fucking _instigator_!"

She verged on hysteria now as her words demanded he see her in the right light, as she grappled for her real absolution from the spinning vortex of confusion, guilt, wrong-doing and self-pity she'd lived in since Will left her in the rain that fateful night.

Jack leaned back a little from glaring at her, his forehead creasing slightly. He didn't say a word; he waited. She wanted him to ask questions, to demand answers, yet she should have known he'd never be that person. With a groan of frustration she shook her head and unfolded her arms, running a palm through her hair and turning to the side, blinking her eyes.

"Are you just going to stand there?"

Calmly, he responded.

"What are you talking about, Liz?"

She looked back at him, her hair falling messily around her face, her voice still harsh.

"I grew up in that ridiculously stifling hell they call the _aristocracy_, taking orders from my father, spending my damn life being groomed as the _perfect_ nobleman's wife. All I wanted was to get out. No rules, no corsets, no bloody seen-and-not heard rules. I attached myself to Will because he was the most exciting thing that happened to me. He was like some…Romeo to my Juliet. Forbidden. And he's charming, he's sweet, he never would hurt a fly. He came after me…"

She heard her voice lose some of its edge and take on nostalgia, dreaminess even. She turned again and walked towards the stairs, shutting her eyes and turning her head.

"Isla de Muerta." She started again, her voice hard. "_You_." She added, throwing the word over her shoulder at Jack. "_That_ was what I wanted. My mother was a Navy Admiral's daughter. She told me the sea was in our blood. I love it. And I hated the confines of society. That's what my attraction to Pirates and Privateers was all about. In Port Royal, Will was the closest thing I got to freedom. I painted an image of him in my _girlish_ mind—swashbuckling, gun-toting, rescuer. I was a sixteen-year-old girl and I fell in love with him and what I wanted him to be. And he came after me, after I pulled that reckless stunt with Barbossa. We came back from Isla de Muerta…it wasn't the same. I wasn't the same,"

She paused, whirling back to look at him. He looked at her with a hard expression, his gaze cool, listening, but not judging. Just like she had been when he spoke of Carolina.

"Do you see it, Sparrow?" she asked, "are you beginning to realize what happened?" she laughed sarcastically and turned away again, using the rolling waves for strength. Oh, this felt so good.

"My father, Norrington, they all thought the ordeal would 'cure me of my ridiculous obsession with pirates', when all it did was fuel the damn fire. I looked at Anamaria and that's what I wanted. That girl owned her life, she could do what she willed and damn well when she willed it."

Elizabeth licked her lips, remembering that day on the battlements, when Norrington had relinquished her to Will, being the bold one, an old romantic at heart she had thought. She had tipped Will's hat off, called him a pirate. _Ordered _him to be one, was more like it.

"I married Will," her words were gentler, softer now, "because I loved him. And I thought I'd triumphed over all of them when I got my way and I got him. And he was content to settle down into our ordinary, every-day life. Have babies, make an honest living, and never again talk about the Black Pearl or have any kind of adventure. And I got bored with that real fast."

Elizabeth turned around and crossed her arms again resignedly, looking at Jack, and then far off, her head moving slightly. She paused a moment, her lips moving slightly, blinking her eyes.

"He and I…Will and me…we were never compatible. He only hated society because it prevented him from being with me, and I think, deep down, once we were together he was happy to keep quiet and not stir the fire. Life was easier when you didn't butt heads with the higher-ups, right?"

Elizabeth snorted and raised an eyebrow at Jack.

"I hated it. Bartering with the other tradesmen's wives, talking about babies and housekeeping. It was all just as bad as sitting in a pretty dress with needlework in my lap. It wasn't Will's fault that I hated his life, that I realized all too quickly that wasn't freedom. I don't even know why I fooled myself that long. I wasn't in love with Will, I was in love with the person I wanted him to be—the person he was, when it was necessary for him to save me. It was annoying, the way he pandered to his buyers, wanted to please them so badly. He did think my behavior was...inappropriate at times. It just contributed to the less flattering light I was seeing him in. I was stuck in remembering this ship and that island and those days…and he was trying to make a life for us. I just wouldn't cooperate. I got so sick of the monotony…I just took a bullet to the whole fucking thing."

Elizabeth shook her head again. She shifted her weight and looked up at Jack. He had leaned back against the railing again, and was looking at her from under the brim of his tri-corn hat, an impassive, unreadable look on his face. His knuckles were white where he gripped the wood.

"I purposely dwelt on what I didn't like about him. I acted out, so we fought about it, how his clients took it. He was worried about losing money; it wasn't that he disapproved of me technically. But I still hated him for it and I magnified that.

"He despised pirates and I chattered about them incessantly, and I didn't stop even though knew it bothered him. I used that strip of your bandanna in my hair because it reminded me of what I was missing, and he was jealous…he had reason to be.

"He accused me of being careless with those miscarriages. _That_, I was not. Those were…devastating. Losing a child is devastating, even if you initially did not desire it. But I had run him through the mill so much by then he was pretty much sure I was trying to ruin everything. We fought, and I fueled the fire. He accused me of regretting giving up the comforts of life, and that enraged me. I all but chased him into that other girl's arms…I hated her and his adultery because he needed someone who would love him and care for him like he deserved and I wore him thin; somewhere in there he threw in the gauntlet and he just _knew_.

"He repressed me, unwillingly. He cheated, and that betrayal I'll never forgive him for. But he was not flawed in character and he did not turn into some monster after we were married. I turned him into one; I destroyed him. When he shoved me that night…that fight during the storm…it was so much easier to let him leave than to leave and devastate him. I played the victim for years. "

She glared at Jack, anger boiling at herself in her veins. Her voice was hard, raw, as she came to the crux.

"I destroyed myself because of what I did to him. Because I blamed him and ruined all his dreams, I ruined my own first. I trapped myself in a relationship that was nothing but a figment of my imagination. There was teenage foolish love there, not real, passionate emotion. That died, I wanted a way out, and I damn well found a way to get it, simply because I'd always gotten my way before." She took a shuddering breath "I'm not saying he's an innocent character because he _isn't_!"

She paused, her voice starting to tremble again.

"He isn't. But he didn't deserve the medicine I gave him. Tortuga was never what I wanted, but after that it was what I deserved. I was my own keeper there, and I ruled that place. And then you came along. _Dammit_, Jack. You made me face it."

He stepped forward slowly as her words faded out, his glare hard and staring, his eyebrow just slightly raised. Lips pressed tightly together, he leaned his face down to hers slightly, his shadow falling over her, coolly letting her drown in his onyx glare for a moment.

"You could have had it all, Lizzie. Why'd you do it?"

She froze under his glare and his demanding words.

"I just told you, you arrogant _bastard_," she whispered hoarsely, her brows slanting, trembling lips forming a scowl. "Don't you get it?"

In one fell swoop, she jerked the compass out of Jack's belt and knocked it violently open. The needle immediately locked in front of her straight ahead, and she smirked at it triumphantly, contemplating giving it a good kiss. She looked up from the compass's steadfast needle to Jack's smoldering eyes.

"It's you," she said quietly, "It's always _been_ you."

She waited for his reaction. He looked at the compass as if it had either betrayed him or revealed the secrets of life and death to him, she didn't know, his look was hard to fathom. Then, carefully and slowly, he plucked it from her palm, transferred it to his own, and let her watch the needle spin back to face her. She quirked an eyebrow, looked up at him. He snapped it shut and chucked it behind him.

"Interesting turn of events," she said shortly, barely getting the last word out before his hand slid up her neck and into her hair, tilting her head back. His eyes were hard and blazing when he kissed her, his other hand pressing against her waist, heavy on her skin through the material of her clothing.

Ice melted to puddles; colors exploded behind her shut eyelids. The sun seemed hotter as it touched her skin and the world seemed lighter on her shoulders. If she could tentatively start to consider sins absolved now…she could call everything right. She could move on.

His lips stayed close to hers when he pulled back slightly and allowed her to gasp for a much-needed breath. Her eyes widened, finding his so close to her, a smirking grin creeping over his lips, a glint of mischief back in his eyes.

"Ye could have saved young William a lot of trouble, darling," he started lightly, slightly admonishing, "if you'd just asked. I might've arranged us a kidnapping."

Elizabeth giggled, surprising herself. Jack touched his forehead to hers, his arm slipping around her back tightly. She braced one palm against his chest, leaning back to see his face, her fingers curling into the thin material of his dirty white cloth shirt, her head tilted to the side, eyelashes still thick with the remnants of tears.

"I blackened his character to you darker than charcoal. I tore his dreams. You look at me the same? You still see me as the pretty fragile flower, governor's daughter, innocent, ladylike?"

"Thou shalt not judge," Jack quoted in a simple voice, his shoulder lifting ever so slightly, "I am neither your condemner nor your confessor." His hand moved along her spine, fingers trailing the outline of her vertebrae. "And I never saw you as an innocent flower. Definitely not as ladylike," he added with a smirk.

She afforded him a light slap, her thoughts still jumbled, a little uncertain, and yet so clear and straight for the first time in years.

"Don't look back," he spoke, his lips so close they touched hers as they moved.

She looked over his shoulder as his lips moved to the bare space between her neck and shoulder, her hand traveling to the bead in his hair she'd seen him touch as he told his heart-wrenching story in the cabin.

She found the line where the sparkling sea met the far-off horizon and she glared at it hard. The sun would set tonight and rise on a new day.

A day she could, perhaps, make better than the ones it followed.

She had never wanted Will Turner to love her. She had never needed Jack Sparrow to rescue her.

She had needed both of them to show her who she was, and what she was. _They_ had opened her eyes.

And the unforeseen view she was struck with…set her at peace.

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Unfinished Song **by Styx **

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	18. Fairytale Gone Bad

**A/N:** All right, so here's the big Epilogue. I'm satisfied with it, I hope you're satisfied with it...and I have some thanks to give out. First to **RoyalPinkDogs** who has diligently and faithfully read and edited all of these chapters from the beginning. She makes it easier for you to read, corrects my mistakes, and even provided a few suggestions when I had writer's block. Without her, I'd probably still be stuck at chapter 9, writer of a story full of grammatical/spelling errors:] So many thanks to her!

And without further adieu, to all the reviewers who ahve encouraged, critisized, and made me happy: **RPattz Lover 101, Sammer-doodles, NikzFlikz91, JadeBlueAfterGlow, teepirategirl, Son of a Gun, CeeBlack, Sassy Sparrow, punkparty17, Wilty, Spedclass, Beccky, icyblaze, fuxfell, Depperanium, Susie, IAmMadlyInLoveWithJohnnyDepp, linalove, CullensROK4eva25, super-special-awesome-pirate, Anuk, KayleeG, my shankgi-la, Sophies-Welt, Jessi Cullen-Norrington, clementine-rose, Future Mrs. Sparrow, Reality, lovestruck1990, CrazeeMonkee, Marlin Lette, xXxTroubleKelpxXx, Crystalyna du Starrvan, Scullybones, LiasonFan2, Laine, Becca, amycakes, HotIceRed, and Cinder-Bella-4Eva.**

That thanks is extended to all reviewers of this chapter and anyone who reads in the future; your views are always a pleasure!

_~Tell them the fairytale gone bad._

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**Epilogue: Fairytale Gone Bad**

She pulled her hat down over her forehead, covering her face in shadow a little more, as she nodded her head and took direction from the woman in front of her. Elizabeth followed the older woman's wizened finger to the edge of the port, houses down by the docks and the water's edge.

Nodding her thanks again, she turned her back and made her way out of the crowded and busy town, holding her boots in her hand, her toes sinking into the slightly wet mud and green down of the ground beneath her feet. She took cover in a bunch of overgrown palm trees, leaning against one of them, just far enough away not to call attention to herself.

William Turner had no idea he was being watched. He was outside of his little house, bent over what looked like kitchen chairs, tools in his hands, his sleeves rolled up to tanned and muscular shoulders. She could see his hair pulled back as usual; imagining the look of concentration on his sweaty face. Her brow furrowed as she watched him.

The noise from town was quieter here, a dull buzz; she could hear the tap of his hammer along with the men faraway at the docks. Her own ship was docked at the other side of the island, where the area was a bit more tolerant towards her kind. All the better; he didn't need to see their ship.

Above even that noise, a loud giggle echoed across the sloping ground in front of her, and a child ran out of the house behind Will, a little girl in a green dress with her hair tied up in a bow. She looked three or four, from Elizabeth's vantage point; the child wrapped herself around Will's leg and he lifted her up, kissing her on the forehead with a huge smile.

Elizabeth pressed her lips together, squinting a little to focus better. Her once-husband was standing up as a woman exited his house, shouting something, though her words couldn't be heard by Elizabeth. She looked relieved to see the little girl with Will, and reached for her. Will leaned bent forward and kissed the woman, transferring their child into her arms and stopping work for a short conversation.

As their talk ceased and the woman who must be his wife turned to go, so Elizabeth's surveillance ended. She touched the brim of her hat in an unseen salute to him and his family and turned without a glance back, a small smile quirking on her lips.

She had casually asked about him at every port in the past year and a half that she'd been with Jack and the _Pearl_. She'd gotten her quasi-happy ending, and she'd realized a need to see what he had made of himself since their humiliating debacle of a marriage now six years ago. She wanted to see if he'd gotten what he really deserved—and he had. Beautiful child, caring wife.

Everything she hadn't been and hadn't cared to give him. And from what the woman supplying the information told her, he was most successful in his trade. As she reached town, Elizabeth couldn't help but tip her hat back a bit and smile a little wider.

All of the weight of the past was gone. She was finally leaving this mess behind.

Their dreams had always been different. It was better; they were out of each other's lives and out of each other's minds now.

Elizabeth found her way to the outdoor shops that were half in town, half out. She perused the bunches of wild flowers and spices and exotically indigenous plants. She pinched cayenne between her thumb and forefinger and touched it to her tongue, smiling at the fiery taste. She kept her finger at her lips, leaning over to admire a lovely bunch of shockingly purple fresh orchids.

One of them was swept up before her eyes and disappeared, and standing up she blinked in the sudden sun and found herself presented with the very orchid she'd been admiring in a ridiculous mocking flourish. She laughed as she took it, tucking the stem into her bodice, a sort of tease.

Jack's resulting smirk and lifted eyebrow was as satisfying as ever. She quirked an eyebrow back at him and stepped back from the flowers, planting her hands on her hips as best she could with the boots held still in her fingers. Jack turned towards the display and traded coins with the vendor, speaking lightly after a moment.

"You find what you were looking for, Liz?" he asked, off-hand, like he was asking where he put his map of Asia. Just as non-chalantly, she replied:

"House by the waterfront. Pretty wife," she hesitated slightly, "little girl."

"Good for 'im," was Jack's final word on the matter, as he turned around and, surprisingly, presented her with the complete bouquet of orchids. She burst out laughing, real laughter, as she looked at the bunch in her hands, soothed by the perfume of their scent. He just raised a devilish eyebrow and when to tucking away the spices he'd needed into his coat.

By the shops and vendors, off to the side of the street, he met her eyes and reached out to touch the tattoo on her shoulder that the loose sleeve of her simple cotton dress bared, his thumb tracing over the delicate outline of a simple swan.

He turned, and headed beyond the shops to the edge of town, back out over the grassy expanses toward the back of the island, where the _Pearl_ was docked, getting off the marked path and into the over growth, farther away from town. It was quieter out here, the farther they got from the cacophony of the port town. Here were cattle herds and farmers.

Jack Sparrow slung his arm around the woman next to him and pulled her forward, causing her to stumble and shoulder him roughly in the ribs. Grinning slyly, he bent his mouth to Elizabeth Swann's ear and brought into the light their next adventure.

"Ah, Lizzie, I've 'eard tell of a map—"

"A _map_, eh?"

"Don' interrupt. A _map_, aye. Leads to an often spoken of yet never visited and nigh un-findable place…"

"And what place would that be, Captain Sparrow?"

"'S called _Agua de la Vida_…Fountain of Youth—"

"You really want to live forever, Jack?"

"Hell, Lizzie, I just wanna find it before everyone _else_."

Elizabeth threw her head back in carefree laughter and smacked her hand against his chest, boots and all. His hand closed over her shoulder in a possessive grip and she smiled at the sails of the ship that rose beyond the hills.

Home.

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Fairytale Gone Bad by Sunrise Avenue (the italicized line at the beginning is from this song)

Thank you all so very much, this is the end you know, so, farewell, Goodnight, and Goodluck:]

(You can still review!)


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